Kelli O'Hara Shares Stories From FOLLIES, THE KING AND I and More With Seth Rudetsky on STARS IN THE HOUSE

Kelli O'Hara appeared last night as the first guest on Seth Rudetsky's online concert series STARS IN THE HOUSE. Seth and his husband, producer James Wesley, began by sharing that the series was conceived as a way to bring happiness and hope during this time of uncertainty. They contacted The Actors Fund who gave the project the green light, with Brian Stokes Mitchell, Chariman of The Actors Fund, coming up with the title for the daily online concerts. As Kelli O'Hara was brought onto the screen for the start of the online concert, she, Seth and James stressed the importance of social distancing, and prepared to bring some light into these difficult times with beautiful music.

"As you're watching this concert, feel free to be donating to The Actors Fund." Rudetsky urged.

Click HERE to donate.

"Uplift us, if you would!" Seth said to Kelli, who then graced the ears of listeners with A Cockeyed Optimist from South Pacific, a show in which Kelli O'Hara was nominated for a Tony in 2008.

"Still got it!" Rudetsky praised the pitch-perfect (as always) O'Hara before joking, "I'm impressed you were able to Auto-Tune,"

The three brought Jon Lapook, Chief Medical Correspondent for CBS News, onto the screen to provide words of wisdom. He shared why social distancing, hand-washing, and other precautionary measures are so important. He also shared that despite being socially distant, being emotionally close to one another, as STARS IN THE HOUSE is aiming to facilitate, is key.

"There's nothing more important than human contact. So even as we are isolating, we are distancing ourselves physically, we don't want to distance ourselves emotionally. Especially people who are elderly, who are alone. We all need each other. We all need to rely on each other. So that brings us to tonight. Because they may be home, they may be alone, but they're not alone, they've got you guys!"

Kelli O'Hara recounted the story of her first Broadway show, Follies, sharing an anecdote about actress Joan Roberts, most famous for creating the role of Laurey in the original Broadway production of Oklahoma! Roberts "mistakenly" thought that O'Hara, playing an assistant-like role to Roberts in the show, was assigned to be her assistant in real life, insisting for weeks that O'Hara flag her down taxis.

"So, finally the stage manager caught wind of it, and was like, 'Hey... you don't have to get her a taxi....' I was like, 'I don't care, it's fine, Joan Roberts wants me to get her a taxi!' Ten years later, we had a ten year reunion... a 93 year old Joan Roberts... she walks into the party, and she immediately was like, 'Kelli! I've read about you, I've kept up with you! I'm so proud of you!' And at the end of the party she said, 'Hey, you- go get me my driver!'"

Kelli then went on to share the story of cultivating her British accent for The King and I.

"If you listen to The King and I cast recording from my 2015 production, I'm kind of doing my best interpretation of the Queen circa 1940...and when I went to London to do it, the dialect coach said, 'Well, that's wonderful darling, but that accent came in the 1940s and we're talking about a story that came in 1862.' So for London I had to relearn my British accent."

O'Hara then sang Getting to Know You, displaying both the "proper" accent she used for the London production, plus the accent she had originally been using for the Broadway production, and even throwing a good old Long Island Joan Roberts impression in there for good measure.

O'Hara then treated viewers to a glimpse of where the star keeps her Tony Award (won for The King and I)!

Jon Lapook popped back onto the screen to share everyone's thoughts:

"I'm getting a little choked up watching this because you can always count on the arts. This is a tough time and here you are now... and if we're going to be saved it's going to be by the artists and by the arts and we always have been."

Rudetsky then moved to read off audience donations to The Actors Fund and facilitate a Q&A, where O'Hara revealed her dream roles, stating that The Sound of Music is the one Rogers & Hammerstein show she hasn't been a part of, and that she would love to be in Sondheim's Passion.

She revealed that her biggest onstage blooper came when she was performing in Così fan tutte at The Met.

"I went up in Italian, which means that could not pretend my way out or make up or improv new words, so I think I sang a bit of gibberish and I walked off the stage."

O'Hara then shared the process of bringing Jason Robert Brown's
The Bridges of Madison County to Broadway, before singing To Build a Home, her final song of the online concert.

Click HERE to watch Kelli O'Hara's premiere episode of STARS IN THE HOUSE Concert Series with Seth Rudetsky.

The Actors Fund, the national human services organization for everyone in performing arts and entertainment, announced this week that SiriusXM Broadway host Seth Rudetsky and his husband, producer James Wesley, will produce a daily mini-online show, entitled Stars in The House, featuring stars of stage and screen singing and performing live (from home!) on social media to promote support for The Fund's services for those most vulnerable to the effects of Coronavirus (COVID-19).

New shows will be produced DAILY at the traditional theater times of 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. ET. Each star will be singing a mix of their hit songs and/or something unexpected. Between each song, Seth will interview the star as he does on SiriusXM, leading them to give fun, inside stories about their careers. Both the star and Seth will encourage people watching to donate at ActorsFund.org/Donate and James will be giving updates from The Fund as well as giving shout-outs to people donating in real time.

Tony Award winner, Emmy and 2 time- Grammy nominated actress and singer, Kelli's selected Broadway/West End credits include RTC's Sondheim's Follies and The Pajama Game as well as The King and I, The Bridges of Madison County, Nice Work if You Can Get It, South Pacific, and The Light in the Piazza for which she received six Tony Award nominations. Metropolitan Opera: Cosi fan tutte and The Merry Widow. International concerts span from Carnegie Hall to Tokyo. Selected TV/Film: "The Accidental Wolf," "13 Reasons Why," Sex & The City 2, "Masters of Sex" and "The Good Fight." In addition to numerous cast albums she has two solo albums, "Always" and "Wonder in the World." Upcoming: Netflix's All the Bright Places.