NBCKerry Butler is one busy Broadway babe.
Not only is she starring in the hit musical Xanadu, but the 36-year-old native Brooklynite is also recording her debut album. And she appears tomorrow night as a backstabbing assistant to fashion designer Victory Ford (Lindsay Price) on Lipstick Jungle. The new NBC dramedy is based on Sex and the City author Candace Bushnell’s bestseller, centering around three powerhouse women in New York City.
I caught up with Butler, who lives in New York with her actor hubby Joey Mazzarino and their two-year-old daughter, Segi, to talk Brooke Shields, Brooklyn accents and her very hot Xanadu costar.
You have a crazy schedule. How do you do it all?
Yeah, I am doing a lot of stuff. But I have to turn some stuff down. Somehow you manage. I mean, you have to do it while you’re hot, right? Next year, I’ll be like, “Why don’t I have anything?”
I watched your first episode of Lipstick Jungle. I didn't expect you to be a bad girl.
I love doing it, because it’s so not me, really. And it’s so much more fun, because I act like the good girl, but then there’s all this stuff underneath. The next episode gets really good. Lindsay and I totally have like a catfight. I even had a stunt double!
What's it like working with Brooke Shields?
She’s such a mom. Her daughter was there with her. She was just being really nice with her daughter. The atmosphere on the set is unbelievable. Everybody is having a great time. I’m not lying. It’s one of the nicest sets I’ve been on.
You grew up in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn. I grew up in Howard Beach in Queens.
You have a lot of Mafia there, don’t you?
It was John Gotti country.
Me, too! There were shootings like a block from me. As I was growing up, I hated being from Brooklyn. I would go into the city [Manhattan] and see how open-minded people were. I sort of made up my own accent. When I was in college, people were like, “You have the strangest accent,” because I just made it up by watching things like Beverly Hills 90210.
You perform on roller skates in Xanadu. So...any roller-skating on Lipstick Jungle?
No one has mentioned anything to me, and thank goodness. I do enough of it already.
Okay, we have to talk about how hot your Xanadu costar Cheyenne Jackson is.
I know. Everybody loves him. During one of our first shows, I was kissing him and some guy screamed from the back of the house, “Oh, you are lucky!” When you get to New York, come see the show. I’ll introduce you.
Yes, please! One last thing, does your daughter want to be in show business?
Well, she’s only two, but she actually does. I took her to see Annie the other day, and then I let her watch the kids singing “Tomorrow” on YouTube. She was like, “I want to be onstage like those kids.”