Peter and the Starcatcher's Celia Keenan-Bolger on Her 'Amazing' Audience Choice Award Win as Favorite Actress

As the evening’s first winner of a Broadway.com Audience Choice Award, Celia Keenan-Bolger (Favorite Actress in a Play for Peter and the Starcatcher) lifted the audience’s spirits with her bubbly acceptance speech. But did she really believe that she won only because of the online campaigning of her brother, Newsies star Andrew Keenan-Bolger?

“Of course I do!” the actress said with a laugh after the ceremony, award in hand. “He was on it: He said, ‘Vote for Peter and the Starcatcher and Newsies,' and we swept the evening.” Of course, the merit of the shows (and Keenan-Bolger’s irresistible performance) had something to do with it: “The fact that we are two really, really great shows helps!” she admits.

When her name was called as Best Actress, Keenan-Bolger says she “absolutely” felt surprised. “I was thrilled, because there were amazing, amazing people in that category [Tracie Bennett, Nina Arianda, Kim Cattrall, Stockard Channing, Angela Lansbury and Cynthia Nixon]. The actress gave heartfelt thanks to fans, many of them “young people who have never seen a show on Broadway or haven’t seen a lot of plays but are coming to see Peter because of Christian [Borle] and Adam [Chanler-Berat] and me. That makes me really, really happy.”

In her speech, Keenan-Bolger mentioned her late mother, who died when she was 21. After the show, she reflected, “Mother’s Day used to feel sort of sad and heavy, but it’s been long enough that it’s not as hard now. It's really amazing to win this award on Mother’s Day for a show and a character I feel like my mom would really love.” Not to mention having two kids on Broadway!

Keenan-Bolger and her co-star Adam Chanler-Berat returned to the podium when Peter was named Favorite New Play. “I feel like our show is this tiny little secret on Broadway that anybody who sees it says that it’s like nothing they’ve ever seen and it’s one of their favorite things that they’ve ever seen,” she said. “I just want a lot more people to see it! It was so special tonight for fans to recognize the show.”