Once Stars Steve Kazee & Cristin Milioti Talk Showmances and ‘Terrible’ Cover Bands in Time Out New York

Steve Kazee and Cristin Milioti spends their evenings in an onstage Irish pub as the stars of Once, the Dublin-set musical romance that just opened on Broadway. So life was imitating art for these actor-musicians when they headed to the Wayland to pose for the cover of Time Out New York's Spring Bar issue. This charismatic pair dished on their critically acclaimed new musical, which began life as a sleeper hit film starring Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova.

“I’ve always felt very strongly that if you copy an original, then copy that copy, it just will degrade into something that is completely illegible,” said Kazee, who was a huge fan of Hansard and his band The Frames long before getting involved with Once. “I try to bring my own sort of flavor to [the show], knowing that I’m nothing like Glen. I tried really hard to just open myself up and make the performance my own.” Milioti, who has never seen the original film or heard much of Hansard and Irglova’s music, has a very different history with the piece, but agrees with Kazee about the Once cast's rock star dreams. “I think it’s the best feeling in the world, to [play music together] every night,” she said. “We’re sort of like a band now, ’cause we’ve all known each other and have been playing this music together for a year.”

Also up for discussion are the possibility of a showmance between the two (none), their favorite watering holes (many) and Kazee’s “terrible” ’80s cover band called Funky Brewster Magnum P.I (really). See Kazee and Milioti on the pages of Time Out, then catch them on stage at the Jacobs Theatre.