On Her First Tour, Stereophonic’s
Lauren Wilmore Dreams Big and Aims High

By Steve Duffy

For Lauren Wilmore, the moment she stepped onto the stage of the Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles was more than a professional milestone — it was a homecoming. The same theater where a young Wilmore had once watched lions stride down the aisles and Elphaba fly into the heavens was now the place where she made her national tour debut, surrounded by the teachers, family members, and friends who had helped her get there. “It felt like a celebration for my whole community,” she says.

That debut came as part of Stereophonic, David Adjmi’s acclaimed ensemble drama that became the most Tony-nominated play in Broadway history, ultimately winning five awards including Best Play. On the tour, which plays the Emerson Colonial Theatre through March 15, Wilmore serves as understudy for the role of Holly — a Black British keyboardist and vocalist navigating both the creative intensity of a 1970s recording session and the quiet fractures forming within the band around her. It’s a role that has demanded deep research, physical transformation, and a willingness to ask hard questions about identity, belonging, and what it costs to be accepted in spaces not originally built for you.

For Wilmore, those questions have been anything but abstract. As a bisexual actress of color working on a show that doesn’t explicitly center LGBTQ+ narratives, she has found ways to bring her full self to a character whose inner life the script only partially maps. The experience, she says, has not only deepened her craft but fundamentally shifted how she sees her own future — pushing her, in her words, to dream bigger and aim higher than she ever allowed herself to before.

Steve Duffy: Please introduce yourself.

Lauren Wilmore: My name is Lauren Wilmore. I’m an actor, singer, dancer, and choreographer. Working on this show has helped me reconnect with my musician side—something I don’t often get to showcase. I’m originally from Pasadena, California, and currently based in New York. I understudy the role of Holly on the Stereophonic Tour.

Steve Duffy: What does it mean to you to make your debut with this show?

Lauren Wilmore: I’ve been performing since I was a kid—never professionally at first, but always with a huge passion for it. Being part of a show that means so much to people has truly been a dream come true. It’s an honor to work with such an incredible cast, creative team, and crew.

I grew up in Los Angeles, and I recently had the chance to go on in this role at the Pantages Theatre. That’s the theater where I saw The Lion King as a kid—back when I was young enough to think the animals walking down the aisles were real. I saw Wicked there, Hamilton there… It’s the theater where I fell in love with Broadway. Being on that stage felt like coming full circle.

So many friends and family were in the audience, along with former acting, dance, and voice teachers—people who believed in me and helped me get here. Sharing that moment with them felt like a celebration for my whole community. I’ve wanted to do a national tour for years, and being on my first one now is just incredibly exciting.

Steve Duffy: Can you share your reaction to the script when you first read it?

Lauren Wilmore: I thought it was so cool. I hadn’t seen the show on Broadway—I’d heard the buzz, saw the Tony performance, and knew people loved it, but I never got the chance to see it in person. So when I finally read the script, I immediately understood why it became the most Tony-nominated play of all time.

The structure alone is incredible. The set is essentially two rooms: the control room downstage and the live room upstage, where we’re actually playing the music live. In the script, the dialogue is written in two columns—one for each room—and the conversations often overlap. I was literally showing my friend last night over dinner because it’s just so fascinating on the page.

There’s a moment where I’m talking to someone in one room, but every one of my cues is based on a completely different conversation happening in the other room. So I’m listening to dialogue that isn’t “mine” in order to know when to speak. I remember reading that for the first time and thinking, How does this even work? What is this?

The dialogue is so natural and so precisely crafted that, when performed, it almost feels improvised. My friend even asked, “Is it different every night?” because it sounds so spontaneous. But no—we rehearse it meticulously to make it feel casual and off-the-cuff. In rehearsals, we’d miss an and or a tiny connective word, and our associate director would immediately stop us: “There’s an and there.” That level of detail.

So, at first, I was just blown away by the script’s technicality. And the more I read, the more I fell in love with the story itself. It’s such a beautiful love letter to the art-making process, and I really, really appreciated that.

Steve Duffy: What was going through your mind when you stepped on stage for your very first tour performance?

Lauren Wilmore: The performance my friends and family attended was actually my debut. I was so focused on getting all the technical elements right—closing and opening the doors at the right moments, hitting every cue—that I tried not to think too hard about everyone in the audience. I spent that morning journaling and meditating so I could stay grounded and present once I stepped onstage.

What really helped was the support from the entire company. The principal cast was incredibly kind and encouraging, and the crew kept checking in to make sure I had everything I needed. I truly felt taken care of.

By that point, I had been rehearsing for four months—first in our rehearsal studio, then with the other understudies on the road, rehearsing backstage and in dressing rooms. Finally, walking through the show with the principal cast, in full costume, hair, and makeup, felt surreal. It really hit me that this was happening.

Steve Duffy: As a keyboardist and vocalist, Holly plays a vital creative role in the band. How did you prepare to embody a 1970s musician?

Lauren Wilmore: I made sure I felt solid with the music—I practiced a lot and asked all my questions to our music director. For character research, I focused on the fact that Holly is British, so I dove into the world of Black British female singer-songwriters from the 1970s. At first, I was looking for dialect inspiration, but I ended up learning so much about these women—their careers, their stories, their artistry. It helped me imagine where Holly might have come from and build out a backstory for her.

Emily Kwachu, who plays principal Holly, and I talk a lot about the character, and we each have slightly different interpretations of her history. That’s one of the amazing things about being an understudy: both actors get to shape the role in our own way, within the bounds of the story we’re telling. We bring our own ideas, identities, and preparation to it.

And personally, as I read the script and worked through rehearsals, Holly just felt queer to me. That’s not canon—no one has officially said that—it’s simply my interpretation. I’m bisexual, and I love exploring queer possibilities in the characters I play. But I also kept thinking about what it meant for a Black woman in the 1970s to be part of an all-white band. How did she get there? What parts of herself might she have had to minimize in order to be accepted?

Especially for me playing a lighter-skinned Holly, I’ve thought a lot about where she grew up, how she feels about her proximity to whiteness, how she relates to her Blackness, and even why she straightens her hair at the end of the play. All of these questions have shaped the way I’ve prepared for the role, and they continue to inform how I approach her every time.

Steve Duffy: Holly is often seen as the emotional center of the group, even when others fail to acknowledge it. What do you hope audiences understand about her contribution to the band’s creative and personal survival?

Lauren Wilmore: Something I didn’t realize at first—and that our director and associate director really highlighted—is how much quiet authority Holly actually has. Peter can be harsh or dismissive with other band members, but he’s never rude to her. He respects her artistry deeply. The worst he ever says is after a piano solo: ‘I’m not sure about that.’ Otherwise, their dynamic is completely collaborative.

Embodying Holly’s confidence took work. I kept getting notes about posture and presence, so now, before I go on, I do a little power pose to drop into her energy. Even during the show, I catch myself adjusting—shoulders back, sit up—because the physicality really shifts the whole character.

What I love about Holly is how sure she is of herself professionally, even as her personal life unravels. Exploring that certainty has been fascinating, and I’m still discovering new layers every time I go on. Even in understudy rehearsals, we’re all continuing to develop these characters together.

Steve Duffy: Stereophonic became the most Tony-nominated play in Broadway history and went on to win five awards, including Best Play. How has being part of this show influenced your experience as a performer?

Lauren Wilmore: This experience has genuinely boosted my confidence. Broadway has been my dream since I was a kid, but with both my parents in the industry, I grew up knowing how challenging and unpredictable this career can be. It took me years to even say out loud that I wanted to be on Broadway.

Working on this show—and especially with this company—has changed that. Several members of the principal cast were once understudies themselves, and hearing their stories and feeling their support has been incredibly inspiring. And the understudy group I’m part of… we constantly lift each other up. We talk openly about our goals, and they’re always the first to say, ‘Dream bigger. Aim higher.’

For the first time, I feel like this world I was once afraid to imagine is actually opening up for me. I even wrote in my journal that I want to channel Holly’s energy in my career—to have her confidence and her certainty in her art. This show has helped me believe I can carry that into my own life.

Steve Duffy: While Stereophonic doesn’t center on LGBTQ+ narratives, are there aspects of the show’s themes that resonate with you through a queer lens?

Lauren Wilmore: It’s interesting working on a show that, on the surface, feels very straight, while personally filtering so much of my own identity through a queer lens. I’m always thinking about how I want to express myself and how I relate to other people, and this tour has definitely pushed me to reflect on where I fit—what parts of myself I want to honor more deeply. Tour life gives you a lot of space for introspection, especially as an understudy, and I’ve had great conversations with other LGBTQ team members about these questions.

There’s also something about being in a show that’s such a love letter to making art. That speaks to everyone, of course, but queer people have had such a huge influence on theater and music. In my research, I kept thinking about the queer artists who came before me—people who shaped these industries while finding their own ways of being true to themselves. Tapping into that lineage feels meaningful. It reminds me that authenticity, in whatever form it takes, is part of a much bigger legacy.

Steve Duffy: What are you most excited about as Stereophonic continues to travel to new cities and audiences?

Lauren Wilmore: One of the best parts of this tour has been getting to see friends and family all over the country. I have cousins and close friends scattered across so many of the cities we’ve visited, people I usually only see once or twice a year if I’m lucky, so reconnecting with them has been really special.

I’ve also grown incredibly close to this cast. As the tour starts to wind down—we still have a few months left, so there’s plenty of time for people to see the show—it’s already starting to feel a little bittersweet. I’m trying to stay present: exploring every city, enjoying the time we have together, and appreciating the experience as it happens.

We’re all slowly beginning to think about shifting back into our New York lives, but before that happens, I really want to savor these last months on the road.

The national tour of Stereophonic continues at the Emerson Colonial Theatre through March 15. For ticket information for the Boston run, visit the Emerson Colonial website at this link. For more about the national tour of Stereophonic, visit the show’s website at this link.

Watch this preview video of the Stereophonic tour: