Kelli O'Hara

I love to play things that are out-of-the-box. It's just that I don't always get the chance to do it!

I love playing an ingenue, and I love doing revivals, and I will continue to do that.

The hardest role that I've ever tried to play was Clara Johnson in 'Light in the Piazza' at Lincoln Center. It was the least fun I've ever had, but the most beautiful experience I've ever had. I could not understand her. I could not put my feet in her shoes. I came home every night, and I was depressed.

To play a character is to inhabit the world and the life of that character.

I suppose there are a lot of reasons to be jaded or sarcastic or bitter in life, but I hang on to the reasons why life is beautiful.

When I was a kid, I would sing in people's living rooms and for different little family things.

When you step out and do a song in a musical, the easier thing to do is make it funny. But when those transitions become necessary, when they aren't camp, that, to me, is magic. I've done musical comedies and enjoyed them, but subject matter that's deeper and more realistic is always what's appealed to me most.

I don't ever sing classically when I am singing a contemporary score - I kind of try to fit in whatever needs to happen.

I think it can be a good idea to know what you do well and use that to open the door for yourself. Once you open the door, close it behind you, and start to make changes.

My great-grandfather, Peter O'Hara, was born in Ireland, I believe, in County Clare. His father, my great-great-grandfather, had actually come to America a generation before when times were very bad in Ireland. He worked in the Pennsylvania area and did well with horses and farming.

I don't ever think about the roads I didn't take because I spend too much time thinking what's ahead. I don't go backwards.

I've had great opportunities to show different sides of myself, but the challenge will always be getting either people to let you do it or finding the right things to do in order to do it.