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Laverne Cox has opened up about her experience starring in musical comedy The Drowsy Chaperone alongside an all-trans and non-binary cast.
Speaking to PEOPLE on the red carpet at the 2025 WWD Honors in New York City on Oct. 28, she said it was a “dream come true” to perform in the show, which ran for one night only at Carnegie Hall on Oct. 20.
“I played the title role in ‘The Drowsy Chaperone,’ which was at ‘Breaking the Binary Theatre,’ and it was incredible. I mean, we had all-trans and non-binary talent on stage,” Cox, 53, explains.
Cox went on to say that she is still thinking about how much the show, which mimics the extravagant, carefree style of 1920s American musicals, meant to her.
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“I’m still speechless,” she continues. “Carnegie Hall has been a part of my life since I was a kid in the sense of dreaming of Carnegie Hall and going to Carnegie Hall and going to different concerts and recitals. So to be able to perform there was a dream come true. It was magical, the cast was magical, the experience, the characters, it was perfect for my Carnegie Hall debut.”
The Orange Is the New Black alum highlighted the importance of transgender and non-binary representation in mainstream theater.
“We could use more expression in theater everywhere,” she says.
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Most recently, Cox starred in the Prime Video comedy series Clean Slate. The show is about an old-school, outspoken Alabama car wash owner and Desiree (Cox), whose estranged child returns home as a proud trans woman.
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Cox, who grew up in Alabama and whose series is largely based on her real-life experiences, previously told PEOPLE that “it wasn’t that interesting back then.”
She went on to say that her “contentious and conflicted family relationships” and “early childhood trauma” made it “quite interesting for the show.”
“[Filming the series]was exciting almost every day,” she continued. “Some actors may disagree, but I think sometimes you need a trigger as an actor to understand what the character is feeling.”
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“If you have a challenging life experience, you can use it in your art,” she continued. “Then people who are looking at this work who may be going through the same thing will understand that they’re not alone. That builds empathy. And that’s the gift of being an artist and going through horrible, terrible things. Maybe you can use that in your work to show others that they’re not alone.”
