Rachel McAdams Admits She Was ‘Intimidated’ to Take on Broadway, but ‘I Pinch Myself Every Day'

"I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it, to be perfectly honest," the actress said of making her New York City stage debut in 'Mary Jane'

Rachel McAdams is making her Broadway debut this April in the new play Mary Jane. And while she's "excited" to be stepping on the famed New York City stage for the first time, she admits she has some nerves about it.

"[I'm] terrified, absolutely terrified," the Oscar nominee, 45, laughed to Paul Wontorek during an interview on The Broadway Show with Tamsen Fadal airing April 6. "I was intimidated to take it on, so there was always something hold me back a little bit."

The Mean Girls star said that her thought changed when she read Mary Jane. Written by Pulitzer Prize finalist Amy Herzog (4000 Miles), the drama follows a singer mother with an ailing son living in Jackson Heights, New York, who adapts an unflagging optimism to face life's insurmountable odds.

"It just got its hooks in me and I was like, ‘There’s something in the universe that’s telling me this is the one,' " McAdams said, noting it's "hopefully not the last one" she'll do on Broadway.

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"The energy that this play follows moves in a lot of places, but it’s all relatable; it's all is grounded still, even at its most heightened moments," she explained. "This play is just so gorgeous, the writing is incredible. It's heartwarming and it’s heart-wrenching and it’s surprising and it’s funny. And it’s a testament to the human spirit. It certainly is a play that has changed me."

Her fears about doing Broadway have been squashed a bit since she's gone through the rehearsal process, McAdams said.  The show has only had a few performances so far, having began previews on April 2 at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre ahead of an opening night on April 23.

"We’ve gotten up on our feet," McAdams noted on The Broadway Show, opening up her experience of working with director Anne Kauffman (The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window). "I’ve gotten to ask a million questions, still have a million more. ... [But] I can feel it, you know, the nerves subsiding a little bit as we just, you know, find it."

"It’s hard to kind of wrap — I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it, to be perfectly honest," she gushed. "I pinch myself every day and the little theater nerd in me is freaking out."

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That doesn't mean McAdams is saying goodbye to film and television anytime soon. "I find I’m endlessly challenged by film and television still — like I’m not bored there," said the actress, who most recently had roles in the TV series Dave and in the films Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret and Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, all in 2023.

Asked the difference between performing in those mediums, McAdams told Wontorek, 51, that there are pros and cons.

On the downside? The dialogue. "The workout my brain is going through to learn all these lines and then not just throw them away, you know?" she said. "In film and television, you learn a page, you throw it away, you never see it again until maybe a reshoot a year later on."

But then there's the comfort of rehearsals. "I love coming to work in my pajamas and staying in them," she noted. "Film and television, you might show up in your pajamas, but you're not going to stay that way. So, you know, just kind of not thinking about hair and makeup and just really getting into the nitty gritty and the meat of it every day."

She also loves the time she's able to put into the work. "I love the finessing," she said. "Sometimes in film and television… Like a year later after I wrap something, I’ll wake up in the middle of the night like, ‘That’s how I should have played that scene.’ And it feels like, you know, maybe there’ll be moments of that here, but you just get so much time with the material and so much time to mess it up and get back on track and then mess it up again."

And then there's the live audience, something that'll be new to her. "That sizzle of playing with an audience and talking to them and whatever they’re going to give back? I’ve been told you can hear everything; you really do feel them so palpably, so I’m sort of terrified of that," she said. "And also, looking forward to it."

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Mary Jane also stars April Matthis, Susan Pourfar, Lily Santiago and Brenda Wehle.

Tickets for the Manhattan Theater Club production are now on sale. The Broadway Show with Tamsen Fadal airs weekends in syndication (check local listings).

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