Bernadette Peters Fandom, Godspell's Divine Early Days & More from Hello, Dolly!'s Victor Garber on Show People

After steering clear of performing in musicals for over a decade, Victor Garber is back on the Great White Way alongside Bernadette Peters in the hottest ticket in town. Currently making classic musical theater magic as the delightful curmudgeon Horace Vandergelder in Hello, Dolly!, Garber has won fans on both the stage and screen throughout his extensive career. Here's what we learned from the incredible talent as he looked back on the Sugar Shoppe, Sweeney Todd, Assassins, Annie with Audra McDonald, Titanic and more on this week's Show People with Paul Wontorek.

1. HE'S JUST AS MUCH OF A BERNADETTE PETERS SUPER FAN AS YOU ARE
“I’ve been a complete gushing fan for years, so this has been a dream for me to work with her in this capacity. She’s just remarkable to be on stage with. My role as an actor is to have chemistry with everybody—sometimes it’s more acting than not. With Bernadette, it was instant. In rehearsal, I just fell in love with her. It was so easy because she’s a remarkable person, an extraordinary talent and so generous. She never stops working to make something better. She’s still talking about moments that I’ve said, ‘It’s great! What are you talking about? It’s fine! Don’t worry about it!’ In the show as well, Dolly dictates everything even though Horace thinks he’s running the show. She is running everything. It’s so easy to look at her and say, ‘Wonderful woman’ because every night, I’m just amazed with what she does.”

2. HE ONCE SKIPPED CLASS TO CATCH BABS ON HIS FAVE DAYTIME TALK SHOW
“I once stayed home from school for a week because Barbra Streisand was on. Mike Douglas used to have guests on for a week. I was like, ‘I’m not leaving this room!’ because I was just obsessed with her, like everybody was.”

3. HE KNEW SOMETHING DIVINE WAS BREWING DURING GODSPELL
“I was cast as Jesus, and it was Marty Short and Gilda Radner and Andrea Martin and Eugene Levy and Paul Shaffer was the musical director, people I’m still very close to. It was just a bunch of nutty kids. I remember thinking at the time that I was surrounded by some extraordinarily talented and funny people. I mean, Gilda Radner—before she was Gilda Radner, she was this hilarious girl. You realized, ‘Oh, this is special.’”

Other must-read highlights:

ON THE NEW STACHE
“I wanted a period look. I’m sort of used to the mustache now. I kind of like it. It might last a little longer than the show. Though, every time I eat something, I now feel like I’m eating my mustache. I think, ‘Is there hair in my mouth? Yes, it’s my mustache.’”

ON OVERCOMING SINGING FEARS
“I’m singing again. I had sort of given up on singing completely. I just felt like I lost the ability to really sing the way I could hear myself. I couldn’t do it anymore. And then the great Joan Lader brought me back to Earth. I’m much better, and I feel much more confident.”

ON HIS FANCY TALK SHOW HOST MOM
“Her show was called At Home with Hope Garber. She was one of the worst housekeepers ever, admittedly so. Her cooking and cleaning sessions on the set were magnificent. She was a very glamorous and talented woman who was ahead of her time. She used to be a band singer before I was born. She continued to sing well into her later life. She was a celebrity. I grew up with her shining in our house.”

ON COMING TO NEW YORK FOR THE FIRST TIME
“It was for the Sugar Shoppe, to do Ed Sullivan. We stayed at the Edison Hotel, and I was afraid to leave the room. I was so scared. But then I fell in love with New York.”

ON STEPHEN SONDHEIM DREAMS
“Stephen Sondheim was one of the reasons that I came to New York. I would listen to Anyone Can Whistle in Toronto and would say to myself, ‘One day, I am going to meet him and work with him.’ Who knew?”

ON USING SOCIAL MEDIA FOR THE GREATER GOOD
“I have some problems with it, so I just don’t participate. I’m not on Facebook. I do have an Instagram account that I keep forgetting I have. But I use it to promote Type 1 Diabetes which I am and Alzheimer’s, which my parents had. I’m for causes and for raising awareness and money. Occasionally, I’ll post a picture that I think people would like. Of course, I talk about things that are meaningful to me. But my personal life is my personal life.”

ON HIS ECLECTIC CAREER
“My career is all over the map, and that’s, frankly, the most gratifying thing for me as an actor because I just set out to do as many different things as I could do. I love that that’s the way it is. My intention is just to find great roles and work with great people, and so far, I’ve been really lucky.”

Watch the full episode of Show People with Paul Wontorek below!



Interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

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