Actor Patti LuPone is known for her outspoken and unfiltered perspective, with public pot shots at celebrities such as Madonna and Kim Kardashian boosting her name recognition beyond her award-winning turns on Broadway. But after her latest comments spurred outrage from her peers, LuPone appears to be reassessing her position, beginning with an apology for remarks she made in a recent interview.
A hero to many for her response to texting theatergoers alone, some of the Agatha All Along actor’s support took a hit last fall. That’s when Patti LuPone’s complaints about a sound bleed from Alicia Keys musical Hell’s Kitchen into a neighboring theater where LuPone was performing tumbled over into social media.
In an Instagram post, Hell’s Kitchen‘s Tony-winning star Kecia Lewis took LuPone to task over how the shared-walls situation was handled, saying her actions were “bullying; they’re offensive; they’re racially microaggressive; they’re rude; they’re rooted in privilege, and these actions also lack a sense of community and leadership for someone as yourself who has been in the business as long as you have.” Lauded Broadway artist Audra McDonald, a longtime colleague of LuPone’s, expressed her support for the post via comment-posted emoji.
In an interview with The New Yorker published last week, reporter Michael Schulman brought up the dispute. LuPone’s response was unsparing. “Oh, my God,” she began. “Here’s the problem. She calls herself a veteran? Let’s find out how many Broadway shows Kecia Lewis has done, because she doesn’t know what the fuck she’s talking about … She’s done seven. I’ve done thirty-one. Don’t call yourself a vet, bitch.”
(Playbill notes that Lewis, who is 59, has performed in 10 Broadway productions. The 76-year-old LuPone has appeared in 28.)
When asked about McDonald’s emoji support, LuPone responded, “Exactly. And I thought, you should know better. That’s typical of Audra. She’s not a friend.” When Schulman followed up with a question about McDonald’s ongoing role in Gypsy, he writes that LuPone “stared at me, in silence, for fifteen seconds. Then she turned to the window and sighed, ‘What a beautiful day.’”
