Merle Dandridge Talks About Growing With Greenleaf, Why Her Co-Stars Didn't Recognize Her in Once On This Island, and Her Tina Turner Moment in Dreamcoat | Playbill

Stream Stealers Merle Dandridge Talks About Growing With Greenleaf, Why Her Co-Stars Didn't Recognize Her in Once On This Island, and Her Tina Turner Moment in Dreamcoat The stage and screen star joined Playbill's Stream Stealers June 30 to discuss the fifth and final season of the OWN series, as well as HBO Max's upcoming The Flight Attendant.

Merle Dandridge didn't get cast in the part she auditioned for in HBO Max's upcoming The Flight Attendant. Instead, the show's creators revamped the head FBI agent from an older white man for her. "Which I thought was super cool, that they just completely retooled the character and put me in the show!" Dandridge said, sharing the story on Playbill's Stream Stealers.

Theatre fans know the Greenleaf star from her years "on the boards," as she laughingly puts it, first in the short-lived Jesus Christ Superstar revival, then as Jane in Tarzan, plus stints in Rent and Spamalot. She was last seen in the Tony-winning revival of Once On This Island as Papa Ge, another role originally written for a man.

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Merle Dandridge and Cast Joseph Marzullo/WENN

Watch her share stories about wet sand and the goats in the cast, plus her reunion with director Michael Arden for the concert version of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat earlier this year in the video above.

And be sure to tune in to Greenleaf, the series about the family behind a megachurch co-starring Keith David, Lynn Whitfield, and Oprah Winfrey, Tuesday nights on OWN. Seasons 1–4 are currently available to stream on Netflix.

 
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