Backstage with Ashley Alexandra Seldon of 'Tootsie'

Now that Broadway is back in town, it’s nice to get storytelling back on stage. As Broadway in Austin continues to bring top tier talent, Tootsie plans to offer audiences a hilariously good time. As with any production, the touring cast of Tootsie is packed with talent, and I was fortunate to catch up with Ashley Alexandra Seldon of the cast and learn more about her background as well as her take on the show

Seldon’s path to the main stage wasn’t the most traditional one — though, the journey rarely ever is. Growing up in New Jersey, she was fortunate enough to start with a supportive family and a creative community.

"I went to the same high school as Lauryn Hill, so it's a very artsy town,” Seldon said. “I did musical theater throughout my public school years, and from there decided to pursue it in college. My parents have always been very supportive, which was really nice. After college though, I actually started working in the hospitality field as a housekeeper and then worked my way up to accounting clerk in the headquarters of one of the largest hospitality companies. I found myself in a cubicle for about two years and said, 'this isn't exactly what I was planning on doing.' So I quit that job and then started living on a cruise ship as a singer for a year. That kind of brought me back to the performing that I wanted to do in the first place.”

Seldon’s talents took her across the globe, performing for audiences on a near-daily basis. And while this arrangement may seem like a dream, it did come with setbacks.

“It's amazing, and also a little bit isolating to be completely honest,” she recalled. “You get to travel to all these different countries for free; I woke up in a different country almost every day for 365 days straight — which, for the travel bug in me, is absolutely amazing — but it's kind of hard to connect with your friends and family when you're in the middle of the ocean. You do have to pay for the internet. So, it was something I absolutely loved, something I would hesitate to do again.”

Once she was done galivanting across the seas, Seldon made her way back to New York, ready to hit the ground running to continue her career in performing. Part of the battle was simply getting her name back into the conversation.

“When you're gone for a year, it's not that people forget you, but you know, out of sight out of mind. They haven't seen you in a while,” she explained. “So you kind of had to remind people that you existed. It was a lot of hitting the pavement. I was living with my parents for the first couple months until I could find an apartment in the city. When you're commuting from New Jersey, that means a 4:00 AM wake up and taking the first train into Manhattan and waiting outside on the line for three hours until they let you into the building with a bunch of people.”

Since then, Seldon’s efforts have paid off in a major way, landing her the part of Juile Nichols in the national tour of the Tony-nominated musical Tootsie, taking her talents on the road to explore stateside — including Texas.

Lukas James Miller as Max Van Horn and Ashley Alexandra as Julie Nichols in the National Tour of TOOTSIE. Photo by Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade.

“I had never been to Texas prior to,” she admitted. “We've already been to Houston and I'm really excited to get to Austin and see some of the other places we're going to in Texas. Anytime I get to be paid to travel, it's a win-win situation.”

Tootsie, based on the 1982 film starring Dustin Hoffman, follows Michael Dorsey, an aspiring actor who’s having a hard time finding a job after ostracizing himself from every theatre community when he finally lands a gig.

“[Micheal] creates this persona to audition for this show that his friend told him about and he gets cast in it,” Seldon details. “In that production, my character, Julie, is already in it and they form this Alliance to just make this really awful show better. As he's succeeding, he's also spiraling because he is not being himself and it's not easy to keep up with the lie. It's been really cool to be able to play Julie. She's really smart and very headstrong. She knows what she wants and she goes for it, which is just a breath of fresh air; to be able to be someone so strong, but also so vulnerable at the same time — you don't usually get both. So yeah, I've been having a really good time with it. I think people will really enjoy it.”

Despite having grown up near New York City and traveling the world over, Seldon has been impressed with the Lone Star State so far.

"It was just so big,” she exclaimed. “I think what it is, is when I think of a city, I'm just so used to New York that I feel like New York is special and the buildings are big and that's just what New York is, but coming to Houston I was like, 'oh, this is a major city with these insanely tall buildings and a really beautiful skyline. And then the food was absolutely amazing! The theater was stunning as well. The audiences were just absolutely kind, which was really great. It was a really, really great experience and a nice introduction to Texas.”

Tootsie is on stage at the Bass Concert Hall February 22 - 27, 2022. Tickers start at $35, and are available at texasperformingarts.org and BroadwayinAustin.com