Love on the big stage: Couples star in Broadway’s ‘Aladdin’ and ‘The Lion King’

By MARK KENNEDY

NEW YORK (AP) — This Valentine’s Day, Rodney Ingram will be doing what he loves with the one he loves. All on Broadway.

The newlywed plays the title role in Disney’s “Aladdin” alongside his wife, Sonia, who covers multiple roles. It’s a workplace romance at the pinnacle of musical theater.

“This is so rare,” he says. “This is such a gift and a dream. I couldn’t have thought to have even prayed for it.”

The couple first met in Mexico City on the first day of rehearsal of “Aladdin” in 2021. She joined the Broadway show in 2024, and they were married last December.

Then the call came this winter for Ingram to step into the role of Aladdin permanently. He didn’t have to think about it. Plus, his favorite person was there.

“This is her show,” he jokes. “I’m just living in it.”

Love is in the air

The Ingrams aren’t the only couple working together on Broadway. They’re not even the only Disney couple. A few blocks away, Mduduzi Madela and Nteliseng Nkhela are both in “The Lion King.”

“It’s beyond any of my wildest dreams,” says Madela, who was raised in South Africa and has been picked to step into the role of Simba permanently later this month. “My wife is the one who’s the proudest and she’s the very first person to announce it to anyone.”

He joined the Broadway company in 2013, following several years in other productions around the world. She joined the Broadway ensemble in 2010 and understudies Rafiki. They got married in 2021 and have two daughters.

Madela met his future wife at a workshop for “The Lion King” in South Africa in 2003. Their friendship lasted a decade until things took a turn into more serious territory.

Both have been onstage as Simba and Rafiki as their daughters watched in the Minskoff Theatre seats, an astonishingly rare moment. “It’s not a usual phenomenon to see both your parents on the Broadway stage at the same time,” he says, laughing.

How Rodney met Sonia

Back at “Aladdin,” Rodney Ingram’s rise to the title role caps a remarkable ascension for a young actor who was raised in the tiny Mexican fishing village of Sayulita and fell in love with DVDs of musicals.

It started with a love of music. Ingram recalls always wanting to sing with the mariachi bands and falling in love with “My Fair Lady” and “Fiddler on the Roof.”

“I just remember imitating them on screen and just watching over and over, becoming kind of obsessed with musicals. That same passion still exists today,” he says.

When it came time to audition for musical theater schools in New York, a rude awakening awaited. “I had no formal training, only the love of the game,” he says.

He found himself competing against trained actors who knew their way around a pirouette. He had never taken a dance class. Ingram faced rejection but vowed to get better.

“I think that motivated me even more. I didn’t get accepted into any musical theater school that first year and I don’t blame them. I wouldn’t have accepted me either,” he says.

After months of training, he tried again and landed a spot at New York’s Collaborative Arts Project 21, a professional theater company with a conservatory. This time, he nailed a pirouette.

He credits his parents for always supporting his vision. “They’ve seen ‘Aladdin’ more than most people ought,” he says, laughing.

Mexico and a life partner

After school came regional theater — “Little Mermaid” at the White Plains Performing Arts Center in New York, “Little Women” at Theatre Aspen in Colorado and “Kiss Me Kate” at Gretna Theatre in Pennsylvania.

Ingram made his Broadway debut as an understudy for Aladdin in 2015, a year after he had scored a discounted, same-day ticket for the last row of the balcony to see the show for the first time.

“I thought, ‘Wow, this is incredible, really remarkable.’ But still such a nebulous dream that I could possibly end up there one day,” he recalls.

He spent two years as an understudy, going on maybe 20 or so times. He then played Raoul in “The Phantom of the Opera” for a year and returned to “Aladdin” just as the pandemic shut shows down.

When the world restarted, Ingram was tapped to lead a production in Mexico City, performing the role in Spanish from 2021-23. “Aladdin” would change his life again.

“I got to meet my wife on the very first day of rehearsal. We started off as friends,” he says. “I had no idea, obviously, that we’d get married four or so years later.”

The couple endured a long-distance relationship when she joined the “Aladdin” North American tour. “She said, ‘It’s going to be OK, honey. It’s not like I’m going to Alaska.’ And I look at her schedule and I’m like, ‘I think you are going to Alaska.’”

Now they take the subway to work together, on the same schedule, in the same city and in the same show.

“We’re exactly where we’re supposed to be right now,” he says.

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