Derek Keeling
Hometown: Charleston, West Virginia
Currently: Rockin' and rollin' in his Broadway debut as Danny Zuko in Grease at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre.
Gotta Dance: An active child, Keeling enrolled in dance classes at age three and enjoyed sports of all kinds. "It's ironic that Danny's an anti-jock, because I was captain of my track team," he says with a laugh. The experience of being an athlete with an affinity for pirouettes ultimately proved useful: "Danny has to be a cool T-Bird, but he can be himself with Sandy—and that was me," Keeling says now. "I'd be one person with my friends, then sneak off to dance class." As the call of the stage grew louder than the call of the finish line, Keeling faced a hard choice. Luckily or unluckily, depending, a hip injury ended his competitive running, steering him toward a performing career. "I didn't even know what musical theater was!" he says, explaining that he had never acted before his injury. However, the former jock took to the craft with ease, graduating from the University of Kentucky with a B.A. in theater.
Oh, Danny Boy: Despite concerns from his parents, Keeling dove into professional acting during college, landing the role of—who else?—Danny in a regional production of Grease. "I was terrible," Keeling recalls. "It was a train wreck!" But the star learned a thing or two, reprising the part in Grease's national tour after graduation. Keeling hand-jived across the nation for two years, performing with stars like Frankie Avalon and Chubby Checker while silencing his parents' apprehensions. "Once my dad saw me onstage with Frankie Avalon, he went, 'Well! Maybe you can do this!'" After the tour, Keeling hit a dry spell, prompting him to ponder quitting the business and leaving New York for good with his then-girlfriend. Then one more Grease gig, a regional stint in St. Louis, came his way. "I was like, this is me! I can't let this go." After heading back to New York, he nabbed a coveted spot on reality casting series Grease: You're the One That I Want!
A Tale of Two Shows: After a few Danny-esque gigs the Elvis-like starring role in a Long Beach, CA, production of All Shook Up and the Fonz in a reading of Happy Days, Keeling shed his rockabilly image for something completely different: dashing young aristrocrat Charles Darnay in the new musical A Tale of Two Cities. It was during the show's pre-Broadway run that Grease came calling yet again—this time on Broadway. Keeling's conclusion: "This is probably my only chance ever to do Grease on Broadway after so many years, and to make my debut with something that fits me. It's the Olympics of Grease!" But Keeling is thankful for Tale, which will open September 18 with Aaron Lazar as Darnay. "To think a year ago I just wanted to be cast, and now I've had my hand in two Broadway shows? I hope [Tale] runs for a while so I can be in it!"
Grease Is the Word: Now performing eight times a week on Broadway, Keeling is elated to be working with Spencer, who placed second in the TV competition and was known as "Ballerina Sandy." "We went through a lot together just to get to this point," he says of his co-star. And now that he's part of the show, the laid-back actor is ready to make the role he knows so well his own: "Danny's a cool guy, but a dorky high schooler at the same time. I hope I bring that duality, because around Sandy he's a bumbling idiot!" Regardless, the whole experience is surreal. "A year ago I was unemployed, standing with my friend in Central Park. I said, 'In a year, everyone in the Broadway community is going to know who I am.' And then the [TV] show happened the next day. You put things out there in the universe, and they can happen."