In Cabaret, Marisha Wallace Is Redefining Sally Bowles

When Marisha Wallace asked her agent to get her an audition for Cabaret, the request came with some of her own research. “I had asked a friend about it, and I was like, ‘Why has there never been a full-time Black Sally Bowles?’ There have been understudies and stuff,” she recalls. “He was like, ‘There weren’t that many Black people [in Germany] in the 1930s.’ And I was like, ‘That’s not true. Can’t be true.’”

So Wallace — who had just finished a run as Adelaide in Guys and Dolls, another role that Black actors don’t typically get to play, and one that netted her an Olivier Award nomination — looked it up. Sure enough, she learned that several thousand Black people, including American expats fleeing concurrent racism in the U.S., were living in Germany at the time, and that Nazis sterilized and killed many of them. “So it was just an enclave of history that was there,” she says. “I found Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany. I read it, and it just opened my eyes to a whole set of history that is there but never had a spotlight shined on it.”

After securing an audition, Wallace got a dialect coach — “I was like, ‘I do not want to be one of those Americans who didn’t have a good British accent’” — and landed the role. Then, as the show searched for an Emcee who could match her, she suggested Billy Porter.

Wallace rang up the actor, a longtime friend, and he told her something that surprised her. “I was like, ‘I want to do this. I think you’d be amazing to do it with me,’” she recalls. “And he was like, ‘Do you know my history with Cabaret? That I tried to audition for the Emcee [in a previous production], and they wouldn’t even give me an audition?’”

Following a run in London, Porter and Wallace are headlining the show stateside at the August Wilson Theatre until it wraps up on Oct. 19, and Wallace is also gearing up for an album release, Live from London, out Aug. 15. It was recorded at the Adelphi Theatre and includes “Maybe This Time,” Sally’s show-stopping ballad from Cabaret. “It’s a one-woman show about my journey from growing up on a hog farm to singing for King Charles,” she says.

In the meantime, Wallace is focused on using her casting to add a new layer to the Kander and Ebb musical. “It’s just been such an incredible excavation of history,” she says. “I feel like we’re telling that story in addition to the story that is already there.”

On American vs. British audiences:

American audiences are very vocal. I got multiple standing ovations on many nights, not even just the opening night. They’re whooping and hollering and responding. People are crying. It’s just amazing to do theater that makes people feel something, or do anything that makes people feel something. People have a lot of emotions about what’s going on in the world right now, and this is a place where they can let those emotions out.

On her off-day routines:

Mostly you’re just resting because there’s not enough time to do anything, really. You’re just so wiped that by the time Monday comes, you just want to sleep. But you want to have a life, too. I’m such a crazy Mexican-food lover, and last Sunday we went to Arriba Arriba, which is the Broadway hangout. I love that spot. I’ve been going there for years. On a Sunday after the show, after you’ve survived, you go get you a chicken quesadilla and a margarita — they have ones the size of your head. And you don’t know who you’re going to see. Last Sunday I took my partner and my two best friends, and then Billy swans in with a caftan.

On her pre-show rituals:

I try to see as many people in the cast before the show starts so I can just connect with people. They don’t have warmup here. In London, we have a mandatory warmup where you get to see everybody together in one space, which is kind of nice. But then I also like having my own time to just be with myself and get into the mode. I do my own makeup as well. I like it — putting on your war paint and getting ready for the battle. I like listening to the music that I think Sally would’ve listened to. I love Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, all the 1940s and ’50s classic jazz songs. But I also like listening to gospel music too. I’ll be like, “Lord, help me get through this.”

On her support system:

Anytime I’m doubting myself, I remember the day of the opening, because my mom was here. Oh, wow, I’m talking about my mama — I’m going to cry. She was lying on the bed, and I just laid on top of her and was like, “Am I going to be good tonight?” She was like, “You’re going to be amazing. I’m always praying for you. You’re covered at all times.” And I truly believe that her prayers are what have taken me through.

I was in London on my own for all those years and didn’t have any family there — I made my family that I have there. I would call her and tell her my dreams and cry when things didn’t go right. And she’d say, “No, you’re just so blessed. You just don’t even know what’s coming.” And she was right. She’s definitely my Yoda, my guru. When I’m at my lowest points, I’ll call her, and she prays for me and everything turns out OK. I’m about to be 40, and I still feel like that little girl when she’s around.