David Abeles on Marrying His Dream Girl and Making Music in Million Dollar Quartet

Age & Hometown: “The most grown up I’ve ever been,” Danville, CA

Current Role: Going great balls of fire as a young Jerry Lee Lewis in the off-Broadway production of Million Dollar Quartet.

Piano Man: After hearing Abeles attack the piano as rockabilly legend Jerry Lee Lewis, it’s no surprise to learn he started lessons at age four. “I continued against my will until I was 12,” he recalls, "then quit for a year before realizing I really missed it." His musically inclined parents were always supportive of Abeles and his two younger siblings, also performers (“psychiatrists would have a field day with us,” he quips), but not overly strict. “My dad was stricter about baseball, once he found out I could play,” the actor says. Abeles was recruited to play Division I baseball, but suffered a torn rotator cuff his senior year in high school. He majored in piano at Emory before switching to voice and finally ending up with, go figure, an English degree. “Maybe I’ll start writing one of these days,” he says. “It’s just song lyrics so far.”

I’m On Fire: Once Abeles decided to become an actor, he attacked it with as much zeal as his music, entering the graduate program at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts. Since graduating he has worked at Williamstown Theatre Festival, New York’s Vineyard Theater and many more. In Million Dollar Quartet, a show he has been a part of in Chicago, on Broadway and now off-Broadway, Abeles is able to let all his talents shine. “I get to do everything I love to do in one place,” he says, “and work with these amazingly talented guys. The culmination of the show for me is standing on top of the piano and seeing the crowd go wild. You start the show as a cocky kid who’ll be a star or die trying, and by the end of the show, you become that star.”

Ho Ho Ho: On an already eclectic resume, one role stands out for this Jewish redhead from the Golden State: Santa. “It’s just a funny voice, a fat suit and a lot of makeup,” jokes Abeles, who spent three years touring with The Radio City Christmas Spectacular. Initially dubious about the job, he was reminded by his agent that he would be touring with 32 Rockettes. From day one, however, he “had horse blinders on” for one particular dancer, and he and Stacey Sund were married in June. While incredibly proud of her Rockette pedigree, a smitten Abeles is quick to put distance between the person and the onstage persona. “She’s bright, funny, does improv comedy and is a wonderful actress,” he says of his wife. “I don’t know what our kids are going to do,” he muses. “They’ll probably go into finance.”