This story was originally published on May 30, 2024. We are recirculating it after Stereophonic, the most Tony-nominated play in Broadway history, won five of 13 Tony Awards.
For six nights a week, Sarah Pidgeon mounts the Broadway stage and crumbles under pressure. Walled off behind a glass pane like a captive animal, the 27-year-old actress attempts to sing the verse of an original song. But she fails, again and again, to hit the right notes. She shrinks under the impatient gaze of the men on the other side, including her domineering boyfriend, who huffs and shouts at her. Of course, this is all part of the act. Onstage, it’s 1976, and Pidgeon is Diana, a fluttering, fragile vocalist caught in a musical relationship that’s threatening to come crashing down, bringing her and everyone in her orbit with it.
Pidgeon is one of the rising stars of Stereophonic, David Adjmi’s documentary-style play about a renowned ’70s rock band in the midst of recording their second album. Hunkered down in a studio in Sausalito, the five members of the group (plus their two bonehead engineers) throw tantrums over recording minutiae, battling their egos and chronic substance abuse. Diana is the band’s Stevie Nicks, a tenderhearted songwriter with a diamond voice who’s overpowered by her boyfriend, Peter, lead guitarist and Lindsey Buckingham of the group. Their blistering fights are the play’s emotional centerpieces. Over coffee, Pidgeon says she can sympathize with her character’s struggle to assert herself: “Being an actor relies on so many people saying ‘yes’ for you to get to do the thing you want to do. I can understand wrestling with that self-consciousness, not knowing if you’re any good.”
We’re having breakfast at Evelina, a Mediterranean restaurant not too far from Pidgeon’s current apartment. She’s a spirited chatter who’s culturally in the know; she recaps the latest Bode scandal, in which bots snatched up their coveted Astro Grabber sneaker, and conspires that a table at the notoriously packed Sailor might be easier to land at brunch. And that’s before we’ve even scanned the menu. Her stark blue eyes widen and crinkle as she speaks, her manicured hands — those are for Diana — choreographing along in precise flicks. Her mouth is curled into a slight smile, as if she might sprinkle into laughter at any moment. “I love to talk,” she says.
Which is great because the press has been chasing her down since last October, when Stereophonic debuted at Off Broadway theater Playwrights Horizons. When it was promoted to Broadway in April, it garnered near-universal acclaim. As of this year, it’s the most-Tony-nominated play of all time with 13 nominations (besting Slave Play, which previously held the record at 12) with Pidgeon securing one for Best Featured Actress in a Play. “I was in bed texting my family, and they were like, ‘Oh my God, Sarah.’ I immediately called Julianna and screamed into the phone,” she recalls. “This is the cherry on top of this huge sundae that I’ve been eating for eight months now.” This is her Broadway debut, but she is a veteran at playing burdened, naïve young women in the process of self-discovery; previously, she starred as a plane-crash victim on the survivalist television show The Wilds and the younger version of Katherine Hahn on Tiny Beautiful Things, about a 40-something train wreck who takes over an advice column. While her next move is uncertain, Pidgeon is sure of one thing: Stereophonic “has changed me on a molecular level.”
Where did you grow up, and where is home for you?
I grew up outside of Detroit, Michigan, in a suburb called Birmingham. Between my junior and senior year, my mom moved to Ann Arbor. So that’s where I go back when I’m in between jobs or it’s the holiday. I love it there. Everyone’s in Birkenstocks and jeans.
I was in L.A., then three months after I signed a lease, I found out that I was gonna do Stereophonic Off Broadway. Then in December, we found out that we were transferring to Broadway. I’ve been in two subleases here in Brooklyn. But my sister and her husband are here, and I’ve crashed with them multiple times, so their couch is sort of my most consistent home base. I think it’s starting to wear on me that I don’t have a permanent address.
What have your friends’ and family’s reactions to the play been?
My first starring role was Mother Mary in the Nativity play. And actually, the guy who played Joseph liked to pull on the swaddling of Baby Jesus, so at one point during our Christmas-pageant show, he went flying across the chapel. But my parents and my sister have seen me do this for so long and they had as much joy and adoration in watching me play Mary as they did watching me do this Broadway show.
Did you always have ambitions of being an actor?
I went to summer camp at Interlochen Arts Academy, where I eventually went to high school. I started when I was 8 years old, doing folklore plays and Jack and the Beanstalk. It was so magical. And then eventually I auditioned for the intermediate section and I started to realize, Oh, I’m actually good at this. Pretending to be these different personas, living these alternate realities of what your life could be — that’s really exciting to me.
What drew you to the Stereophonic script when you first read it and to Diana as a character?
The writing was just so good. When you’re reading a book, sometimes you’re like, Oh, I’m gonna highlight that. Every single line in the script was like that. It was just so human, and I loved how quick it was. The music of it all was intimidating but exciting. And I really liked Diana’s journey finding agency over her art.
What steps did you take to bring Diana from the text to life?
Sometimes people ask, “Who would you look to for inspiration?” And obviously, there are some pretty iconic women from this time, but Diana is not a Frankenstein of Linda Ronstadt and Stevie Nicks. I really tried to look at what Diana was saying and singing about. The thing I struggled with the most was divorcing my 2024 experience from that of a woman in the 1970s. For a while, I was like, How is she still in this relationship? But something my co-star Juliana and I talked a lot about is she doesn’t know who Gloria Steinem is. It’s not our place to judge these women. The audience can do that. I kept being told I’m confronting too much.
What does that mean, “confronting too much”?
I held my ground in a way that Sarah Pidgeon would, and I kept being told that Diana doesn’t want to fight. She’s like, Let’s just move past this. I don’t want you to ask me for what I need. I don’t really even know what I need. Really, she’s an artist who can’t write down in a mission statement why she does this thing. She just feels compelled to do it. That’s something I really connected to, and I love her arc.
When Diana first appears onstage, she’s fast-talking and almost bossy, like an Amy Sherman-Palladino character. We witness her unravel until, at the end, she finds her resolve. Was that evolution already explicit in the script or something you came to develop as you were working through the material?
The script is pretty exacting — David Adjmi wrote it in a very specific rhythm, and I’m a fast talker. At the beginning, Diana is just happy to be there. She can’t believe she’s making music with these people. She was just some girl from Phoenix who was dating this musician and was like, Yeah, I’ll work at the old folks’ home. And then there’s a No. 1 album, and this thing just bubbles up inside of her. The version of herself that’s funny and witty is just molting. At the end, she’s putting her foot down and then immediately after she’s like, Am I being a complete bitch? She doesn’t know how to do this thing, which feels very human.
One common thread between the characters you’ve played, from Leah on The Wilds and young Clare on Tiny Beautiful Things to Diana, is that they’re tasked with being resilient under the weight of enormous pressure. Do you relate to that feeling? Is there something satisfying about playing this type of woman?
There’s something really cool and beautiful about the ugly moments that we constantly find ourselves in. Everybody has faced some shit and had to wake up the next day and go to work. Also, I’m a very emotional person and I like characters that experience their emotions.
I had a teacher at Interlochen who said that acting is like throwing yourself off of a cliff into a dark abyss, and you have no idea if you’re gonna be caught. I just want to keep throwing myself off this thing.
Stereophonic marks not only your Broadway debut but also your professional theater debut. What were the biggest adjustments transitioning to the stage?
When you’re shooting a scene, you have a couple of hours to do as many takes as possible. And then there’s an edit. With theater, there are some days where I walk offstage, and I’m like, I did that so much better yesterday. And I get to do it again tonight. The longevity of this play is quite upsetting. I’m constantly breaking up with my fake boyfriend. Every day, I’m letting down my best friend. Sometimes I’m reaching down within myself and I’m just too tired. In those moments, it’s like, What do I do? Luckily David Adjmi’s script is so good that when you just say the lines, you start listening to yourself and, suddenly, you’re in the scene again.
A pivotal moment of the play is when Diana strains to hit a high B and crumples — it illustrates the anxiety she feels, especially under Peter’s watch. I imagine it might be daunting to have to re-create that every night. What are you thinking about during that scene?
I’m never worried about cracking, but I’m always scared about hitting the high note later. If I don’t hit it, the scene changes. For most of the show, with the glass there, I feel very protected. That’s the moment where instead it feels like a magnifying glass. She’s just looking at the three men, and she can’t lose her shit, because if she does, she’ll be labeled as unprofessional. So most of the time I was like, Oh my God, look at these dudes.
Has that happened before? Where you didn’t hit the note and you had to improvise?
There have been a few times where I haven’t sounded great. But this era of music isn’t pitch-perfect. It’s fine. It’s rock and roll. It’s about the vibe of the song you know you know; it gives it some texture. A lot of stuff has gone wrong. At one point, the backing track came off, things have gone unplugged. The door handle came off when Tom Pecinka and I are supposed to come in to do a band meeting, and we’re knocking, knocking on the door.
I was shocked to learn that you don’t have much of a musical background because your voice is so good.
I played classical piano growing up. Around 13 years old, I wanted to be like Norah Jones. But I never really progressed with piano. It’s not that I’ve never taken singing lessons. When I was 15, my mom and I would drive from Birmingham to Ann Arbor to take lessons, and I had gotten Adele’s 21.
I can definitely hear some Adele in your voice!
Yes, she was influential. I was also learning to drive. I would have my permit, and I would just sing “Rolling in the Deep,” and then my mom would listen to me belt some musical-theater song for an hour.
What do you like to listen to on your own time outside of the play?
I love this band Hovvdy. They’re out of Texas. They’ve probably the band that’s had the biggest impact on me. I love Ethel Cain, how she’s creating this character with chapters and eventually there will be a different persona. I listen to Billie Eilish — this new album is really great.
How are you thinking about the next stage of your career? Are there certain types of roles you want to explore?
I don’t really know. My goal is to pay my bills acting and be in rooms that people I admire are in and who think of me. These directors that work with the same actors over and over again, we understand why — if your friends show up for you, and they do a good job, why wouldn’t you want to work with them again? I think the dream would be to do something else with another cast member from Stereophonic.
If you couldn’t act, what would your backup plan be?
I’d want to teach acting. When I was a kid, I wanted to be the president’s food taster.
Wouldn’t it be easier to be a restaurant critic? Or a food influencer? Surely there are ways to eat gourmet food without risking your life.
I don’t think I can write that well. Maybe a food influencer, but there are already so many. Or a producer. There have been some movies I’ve auditioned for that I fall in love with, and sometimes you don’t hear anything, and it’s like, Oh, they’re still waiting for financing. If I had the connections … I have so many talented friends who have plays or films or pilots and then sometimes I receive stuff and I’m like, This is getting made, but my friends’ thing isn’t?
Do you consider yourself a good organizer?
I don’t think I could spearhead a project, but I can really throw my weight behind something. I have a sensibility and opinions, and I think I’m starting to find all that again. Because when you first get into the industry, you hear “no” so many times. After a little while, you accept the fact that there are so many factors in play and embrace that it’s so much better to have a point of view.
Have you considered pursuing comedic roles?
I’d like to! It scares me. I would so much rather cry than try to make people laugh. My impostor syndrome would get way higher and my ADHD — my undiagnosed ADHD — would probably get worse. I think I have to meet someone who thinks I’m funny.
What about music? Especially now that you’ve performed at a real live music venue?
I can’t write a song …
