While the grueling schedule of performing on Broadway is intimidating to many, Gracie Lawrence is thriving in the environment. In fact, she describes the lifestyle as “so fun.”
“Honestly, I kind of just enjoy being in the theater. I don’t usually leave during the day, I’ll just stay here during my dinner break, too,” Lawrence says. “Something I’m very used to from touring is living in venues. So I kind of enjoy just being in this space and considering it a second home. I have all the things I need, my little snacks, and I’ve napped on the floor in my dressing room more times than I’d like to admit.”
Lawrence, who is one half of the band Lawrence alongside her brother Clyde, is starring in “Just in Time” at the Circle in the Square Theater. The jukebox musical stars Jonathan Groff as Bobby Darin; Lawrence plays singer Connie Francis.
“Just in Time” is a return to the Broadway stage for Lawrence, who made her debut at the age of 12 in the show “Brighton Beach Memoirs.” Taking the stage at 28 years old now has its benefits — “for one, I’m not doing my Spanish homework during the 5-minute breaks” — but her focus remains the same.
“Even when I was 12, I really wanted to do a good job and find the character and find the laughs and find the vulnerability and those things you discover as a kid when you’re learning what being a performer is,” Lawrence says. “They remain so true as you get older. I care about all the same things. I am thinking about character in all the same ways, but now it’s as a 28-year-old rather than as a 12-year-old.”
Gracie Lawrence
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Lawrence first met “Just in Time” director Alex Timbers years ago, when he reached out to say that he was a fan of her band. They ended up meeting, together with Clyde, just to get to know one another and “express our mutual fandom and admiration for each other.”
Years later, Timbers sent Lawrence a version of a script for a workshop for “Just in Time.”
“Everything about it sounded really interesting and exciting to me,” she says. “I already obviously knew Connie Francis’ music, but I wasn’t familiar with her life story. So after I was sent the script and what the part would be and that Jonathan was going to be involved and Alex would be directing and Andrew Resnick would be music-supervising, I just dug in immediately to learn about Connie Francis’ life story.”
The names attached to the project were enough to sell her, but as soon as she started researching Francis’ life she felt a further connection to the show.
“It went from being something that I knew I would do because I wanted to work with these people to something that I needed to do for personal reasons,” Lawrence says. “I really admired her as a woman in music. I was really impressed by how she was so graceful and so poised as a performer and seemed so in control every time, in every video that we have of her, and also behind the scenes how quick-witted and smart and clever she was.”
Gracie Lawrence
Lexie Moreland/WWD
She first met her would-be costar Groff fresh off a flight from Europe after being on tour with Lawrence.
“I got in at 1 in the morning, and then the next morning I went to rehearsal and sang with Jonathan. And I was just immediately like, ‘oh, I think this person’s about to become one of the most significant and closest people in my life,’” she says.
Lawrence, who grew up in New York City and whose father is the filmmaker Marc Lawrence, has been interested in performing since she can remember. Music is her first love — “I don’t remember a time in my life where singing wasn’t really significant to me” — and as she got a bit older, she developed an interest in acting via school plays.
“I think what’s so exciting about a musical is the marriage of those two things,” she says.
Gracie Lawrence
Lexie Moreland/WWD
When not on stage in “Just in Time,” Lawrence is working with her brother on music for the band, with plans to release new material in the near future.
“I like to do all the things at the same time,” she says.
Lawrence gained popularity as an actor last year when she joined the cast of “The Sex Lives of College Girls” for its third (and final) season. She was such a fan of the show that upon being cast she had minimal research to do before joining as Kacey, a transfer student who joined the trio of roommates after Renee Rapp’s character Leighton departed. As the season went on, Kacey’s plotline centered around her auditioning in the school musical.
“It’s been such a kismet thing that whether it’s in my band where we’re doing these performances that are theatrical or whether it’s on ‘Sex Lives of College Girls’ where I’m playing a girl who joins the theater world at her school, I feel like all roads have been leading to theater for me personally,” Lawrence says. “That’s been a very full-circle thing in my life.”
Gracie Lawrence
Lexie Moreland/WWD
