The young actress had joined the non-Equity touring show temporarily when a cast member was injured. When the recovery time of the actress became longer than originally expected, Anderson was offered a role in the musical.
Anderson — known as "Emotional Sandy" on the NBC program — joins her husband, Ciaran McCarthy, who is already in the cast. The couple also serve as understudies to the lead roles of Julia and Robbie Hart.
The tour of the short-lived Broadway musical launched from Gainesville, Florida's Phillips Center Aug. 31 and is currently scheduled to play venues across the country through June 2008. For further information visit TheWeddingSingerOnTour.com.
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Paul Stancato directs the tour based on the original Broadway direction by John Rando. The show's Broadway run ended in December 2006 at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre. For the new tour, Chris Bailey provides choreography, which is based on Rob Ashford's Broadway work. The cast features Merritt David Janes as Robbie Hart with Erin Elizabeth Coors as Julia Sullivan, the roles created on Broadway by, respectively, Stephen Lynch and Laura Benanti. (Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore played those roles in the film of the same name.)
Janes and Coors will be joined onstage by Justin Jutras (Sammy), Penny Larsen (Rosie), John Jacob Lee (George), Sarah Peak (Holly), Mark Raumaker (Glen Guglia) and Nikka Wahl (Linda). The ensemble will include Joel Abels, Andrea Andert, Carrie Cimma, Kevin Faraci, Zach Frank, Susan Leilani Gearou, Kimberly Marable, Ciaran McCarthy, Rebecca Lynn Miller, Lindsay Moore, Matthew Ragas, Rebecca Riker, Jason Samuel, Marco Antonio Santiago and Neil Totton.
The creative team also includes John Mezzio (musical supervisor/coordinator/conductor), Scott Pask (scenic designer), Brian MacDevitt (lighting designer), Gregory Gale (costume designer) and Lucas J. Corrubia, Jr. (sound designer).
The Wedding Singer debuted at Seattle's 5th Avenue Theatre then opened on Broadway April 27, 2006; previews began March 30. The show played 30 previews and 284 performances before closing Dec. 31, 2006. Composer Matthew Sklar and lyricist Chad Beguelin penned the score; the book was written by Beguelin and Tim Herlihy.
In The Wedding Singer "it's 1985 and rock-star wannabe Robbie Hart is New Jersey's favorite wedding singer," according to Broadway production notes. "He's the life of the party-until his own fiancée leaves him at the altar. Shot through the heart, Robbie makes every wedding he plays as disastrous as his own. Enter Julia, a winsome waitress who wins his affection. Only trouble is Julia is about to be married to a Wall Street shark, and unless Robbie can pull off the performance of the decade, the girl of his dreams will be gone forever. With a brand new score that pays loving homage to the pop songs of the 1980s, The Wedding Singer takes us back to a time when hair was big, greed was good, collars were up, and a wedding singer just might be the coolest guy in the room."
