ALADDIN National Tour Gets Ready to Hit the Road

Hello, I'm Richard Ridge for Broadway World. Disney smash hit musical Aladdin continues to pack them in at the New Amsterdam Theatre

Well, now they're getting ready to kick off a brand new reimagined tour and we drop by Open Jar Studios to meet the company

How excited are you? The Genie

I'm so thrilled. This is an absolute dream come true. When I was 16 years old I watched James win his Tony and do Friend Like Me on the Tonys and I was like, I want to play that role

So, to now be here working with this amazing cast, creative team, getting ready to bring this show across the country to audiences across America, it's amazing

It's amazing. This is such an iconic role of the Genie, so what was your callback like and when did you get the call and how did you feel

I had four auditions. I came in, I just initially did Friend Like Me in a scene, I did a work session and then I danced a little bit and then I did the big one for the entire Disney team

And then I found out later that day and I was just over the moon. I was thrilled. I really was speechless. And I'm not speechless a lot, I've got a lot to say. But in that moment I was speechless. It's amazing

Over the moon. Absolutely so excited. Ecstatic. I'm excited to take the story across the nation and part of Canada

This is such an iconic musical. People have flown in all around the world to see this on Broadway, to see the tour across the country. You are now the new Jasmine, you're the new Aladdin

Take me back to when you got that call, like you've got the role. What went through your mind when you heard

Yeah, I mean it was crazy. I don't have an agent and so I got the email that I got Jasmine and I was rolling my big old luggage to go do my laundry and I just happened to see the email and I was like, no, no, no

And I ended up just bawling my eyes out on the side of the street like, mom, I got it

Yeah, I mean I was back home in Jersey. I had a call from my agent and they were like, whenever there's a call, you know, it's good news. So I kind of had a feeling, but I was just pacing around my room, just running around over and over again, like screaming. I'm sure I was a menace to my family

It was also, you had to keep it a secret for a while. So how, did you tell your family? Did you say you can't say anything

Yeah, I mean I told my family immediately, but it was hard. We found out in March and they didn't release it until like August, so we kind of had to keep everything under wraps

So people were like, yeah, like did you sign up for classes yet? Like what are you taking? I'm like, no, I didn't, but you'll see why

Yeah, it was similar. I only told my close friends and my family, but what was nice, we knew each other. Senzel, Marcus and I knew each other, so we had our little group chat for like however many months we've known and we've been able to like bond together because of that, that shared knowledge, you know

An iconic role to play, Jafar. There's always a Disney villain. So when you got the call that you got this role, like what went through your mind

I got to brush up my evil laugh, you know, I got to really work on the mwah. It's a thrill. You know, I grew up with the animated feature from 92 and it's kind of a dream come true to get to like live into one of my memories. It's really cool

Okay, so the first time you saw yourself done up as Jafar, which I believe was this week, with your staff and all, like what went through your mind when you saw yourself all done up

Like, there he is. It really is a remarkable transformation and all of, all these other technical elements really do help get you to, to that, that guy