After spending the last year & a half soaring high above the stage floor of the New
Amsterdam Theatre aboard a magic carpet, Courtney Reed (who plays Princess
Jasmine in the Broadway production of Disney’s “Aladdin”) was ready
for some more down-to-earth activities.
Courtney Reed & Adam Jacobs in the Broadway production of Disney’s
“Aladdin.” Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved
“I was looking forward to spending some time on the
Outer Banks of North Carolina. My family and I go there every year. We’ve been
going to this beach house there ever since I was born. It’s a family
tradition,” Reed recalled during a recent phone interview.
But when Reed tried to get her vacation request approved
back in late May, Disney Theatrical came back with one caveat.
“At that time, they asked if it might be possible —
right in the middle of my vacation — for me to leave the Outer Banks for a
day. To come back and do something really special,” Courtney continued.
“Mind you, the people who produce ‘Aladdin’ couldn’t tell me what I’d be
doing. Not yet, anyway. They were being pretty mysterious about this whole
thing.”
(L to R) Don Darryl Rivera & Jonathan Freeman in the Broadway production of
Disney’s “Aladdin.” Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved
Reed agreed to Disney Theatrical’s terms but then couldn’t
stop wondering what they were being so secretive about. In the end, it was
Courtney’s boyfriend who put all of the pieces together.
“When I mentioned that they needed me to come back from
my vacation for a day to do this thing that I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone
about, he immediately said ‘I bet it has something to do with the White House,’
” Reed said. “And in the end, that’s exactly what it was.”
The cast of this Tony Award-winning musical had been asked
to provide the entertainment at the 2015 Kids’ “State Dinner.” Which
was held in the East Room at the White House back on the morning of July 10th.
The cast of the Broadway production of Disney’s “Aladdin” entertains attendees at
the 2015 Kids’ “State Dinner” in the East Room at the White House.
“So the day before that, I said ‘good-bye’ to my
family, hopped in a car and was driven up from North
Carolina to D.C.,” Courtney stated. “I have
to admit that I was kind of concerned about what it would take to get through
Security at the White House. But that was pretty painless. It was kind of like
going through Security at the airport.”
Now contrast that with what poor Adam Jacobs, James Monroe
Iglehart, and 20 members of the cast
& crew of “Aladdin” went through on the night of July 9th as they
schlepped from NYC to DC. To explain: Disney Theatrical had arranged for this
bus to arrive at the New Amsterdam right after the curtain came down at that
night’s performance of “Aladdin”.
And Jacobs, Iglehart and the other cast members were supposed to hop on board
sometime between 9:30 & 10 p.m. and then doze while this bus is driven
down to their hotel in Washington DC.
“But for some reason or another, the bus never shows.
And it takes ’til almost 1:30 for
the other bus to arrive. Which means that they then don’t get down to DC ’til almost
6:30 in the morning on the
10th,” Reed remembered. “And
given that we were all supposed to be at the White House at 7:15 a.m. that morning … Well, everyone’s in
pretty rough shape at this point.”
President Obama chats with two young ladies at the 2015 Kids’ “State Dinner” in the
East Room at the White House.
So the cast of “Aladdin” is then taken a quick
tour of the White House before they’re then taken upstairs to a function room.
Where these still-road-weary performers can prep prior to taking the stage in
the East Room.
“Now we had been told in advance that the Kids’ ‘State
Dinner’ was really more of a First Lady thing. That — because teaching kids to
eat right is Michelle Obama‘s passion project — we shouldn’t expect to see the
President during our time at the White House,” Courtney continued.
“So when the staff comes in, gathers us up and then starts putting us in
specific seats — ladies in the front,
guys in the back — I just figure that they’re getting us ready to have our
picture taken with the First Lady. But then in walks the President!”
Evidently President Obama had heard about everything that
the cast of “Aladdin” had gone through in order to make it down to DC
that morning. And because he wanted to personally show his appreciation for
these folks making such a big effort to be part of the First Lady’s event, he
headed upstairs prior to the kick-off of the Kids’ “State Dinner.”
First Lady Michelle Obama thanks the cast & crew of Disney’s “Aladdin” for
providing the entertainment at the 2015 Kids’ “State Dinner.”
“And when the President came in the room, everyone forgot
about all of the sleep they didn’t get. No one knew what to say. Everyone was
speechless,” Reed recalled. “And the President was just so charming
and so delightful. He shook all of our hands and repeated our names back and
looked us all straight in the eye with a firm handshake. It was an experience
I’ll never forget. When he left, that’s all we could talk about ’til the
performance. ‘Oh my goodness, I can’t believe that that happened.’ Girls were crying. It was this whole slew of
emotions. It was amazing. It really was.”
Newly energized, the cast of “Aladdin” then headed
downstairs to the East Room. where they then performed a 20 minute concert
version of this Disney Theatrical production (which — over the past few months
— has blown past “The Book of Mormon” to become the third best-selling
show on Broadway, right behind
“Wicked” & “The Lion King”).
“Now you have to understand that the stage in the East
Room was really small. And our job that morning was to take a show that’s big
as ‘Aladdin’ and then make it work on this tiny, intimate stage where the wife
of the leader of the free world is sitting just six inches away from you. Now
factor in that you’re doing this having had no sleep,” Courtney enthused.
“That’s why I’m so proud of our company. Even working under this kind of
pressure, these sorts of conditions, they were total pros. Their voices were
still on point. They were able to sing that early in the morning. They just
dazzled this group of kids who — as the First Lady reminded us later — had
probably never flown on a plane before, never mind not having seen a Broadway
show before.”
Michelle Obama has the best seat in the house as the cast of the Broadway
company of Disney’s “Aladdin” performs in the East Room
of the White House at the 2015 Kids’ “State Dinner.”
And once Jacobs, Inglehart and the other members of
“Aladdin” ‘s ensemble had finished performing at the 2015 Kid’s
“State Dinner,” after a quick photo op with Michelle Obama … Well,
it was time to get back on the bus. Because — believe it or not — they needed
to back in New York City by 8 p.m. for that night’s performance at the New
Amsterdam.
“Whereas I hopped on a plane and — by 8 p.m. — I was back on the Outer Banks with my
family having dinner. And they were all talking about how they’d just seen me
on television at the White House performing for the First Lady,” Reed
laughed.
So long story short: If you’re looking to win this year’s
“How I Spent My Summer Vacation” competition, don’t go head-to-head
with Courtney Reed. Because Princess Jasmine’s tale of
how-she-met-the-President-of-the-United-States will almost certainly beat your
falling-asleep-at-the-beach-and-getting-a-third-degree-sunburn story.
This article was originally posted on the Huffington Post’s Entertainment page on Thursday, September 3, 2015