Sean MacLaughlin on Going from 'Geek' to Broadway Heartthrob in Phantom

Age and Hometown: 32. Petersburg, VA

Currently: Romancing Christine as Raoul, the title character’s handsome rival, in Broadway’s longest-running show, The Phantom of the Opera.

I Thee Wed: Phantom leads are known for their long-term loyalty, and MacLaughlin is no exception, having clocked three and a half years on tour before joining the Broadway company. Luckily, he found love on the road, crisscrossing the country by car with ballet chorus member Elaine Matthews and their two dogs. “We became best friends, then started dating—and then we decided to get married,” he says of his show-mance. A New Year’s Eve wedding is planned at a historic hotel in Red Bank, NJ, minus Raoul’s white tie. “No tails either,” MacLaughlin says with a laugh. The groom’s dress code? “As contemporary as I can get.”

Musical Man: MacLaughlin credits Virginia’s Signature Theatre for launching his career in shows such as Into the Woods, Follies and his personal favorite, Stephen Schwartz’s Children of Eden. But a Richmond production of Jeanine Tesori’s Violet proved life-changing. “I grew up doing Rodgers & Hammerstein,” he says of youthful forays into community theater, “and I didn’t realize what contemporary musical theater could be. After Violet, I got all the [cast] CDs I could, just to immerse myself.” MacLaughlin’s current wish list of shows ranges from A New Brain and Floyd Collins to R&H’s Carousel. A great musical, he declares, “is candy for my brain.”

All I Ask of Raoul: Playing Broadway’s ultimate young romantic hero in Phantom never gets old, “especially since I’m a big geek,” MacLaughlin claims. “I didn’t have my first girlfriend until I was about 20 because I was too busy with chess and comic books. To play something that I never was, growing up, is a lot of fun.” And after three less-than-blockbuster Broadway shows (Bombay Dreams, Lestat and The Woman in White), he’s understandably pleased to be in a hit. “I’m overly sentimental, so every time I walk to work, I tear up,” he says. Still, the fact that he’s in New York to stay hasn’t quite kicked in: “I’m still having a hard time throwing away packing boxes!”