Every Day is a Broadway Dream for LOST BOYS Leading Man LJ Benet, and Even Flying 65 Feet in the Air Won’t Wake Him Up

LJ Benet doesn’t want to forget his newfound Broadway friendships — or the first time he flew 65 feet in the air. 

Benet is making his Broadway debut leading Lost Boys, a show about family (and also vampires) directed by Michael Arden. A lifelong Los Angeles resident and former child actor, we caught up about how the New York City winter treated him (and his dog, Boston), his experience on Jesus Christ Superstar at the Hollywood Bowl, and his daily gratitude walks that remind him this is all, in fact, real.  

Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

How has the city been treating you? I imagine that the winter has been … interesting.

I don't know how you guys do it, I'll be so honest with you. It's been cold. I got two blizzards when I moved here. I moved top of January, and people were like, “You're going to love New York. We haven't had snow in forever. It is going to be great. The winters haven't been that bad at all.” It's not true. It was hectic. Boston [my dog], I walked outside with him once and he was like, “What is this?” He was pissed. He was so mad, but it's been good. I've been getting used to it. Honestly, I'm super pale as is, so I thrive in darkness and just not a ton of sunlight because I burn like a lobster, so this has actually been good for me. But I definitely have been taking like Vitamin D because I haven't seen the sun in four months.

You’re so real for that, the seasonal depression can be tough. And sorry, we totally pranked you. We actually haven't gotten snow at all forever.

I know, you have it! Everyone's like, “we haven't got it,” everyone's just gaslighting me, like, “it's not that bad!” I'm like, “the blizzard! The government shut down Broadway! What are we doing?!”

No, I really enjoyed watching all the cars try to just dig themselves out. I was like, "Oh, cool, cool, it's 2016 again.”

I can see there's like a line of cars that I can see right outside my apartment and there was one car that he just tried to go over and then he just got stuck. I swear his car was at an angle for about two weeks. He just gave up.

That sounds about right. Do you have any New York spots so far? Where are you going in between rehearsals?

I'll be honest, I'm a hermit. I stay in, I order Uber Eats to the theatre and just like stay in. I'll take Boston out on a walk. There's this place, I had one of the best chicken sandwiches I've ever had in my entire life, it's called Blue Dog in Hell's Kitchen. I don't know if you've ever been there.

I haven’t, but now I might.

I sat in this booth, not even a booth. It was the end of the booth so my butt was like sticking off but then the food came and I was like “This is worth it. I’ll sit on the floor.” It was so good. Everything’s been so good that I’ve gone to, but that was really good. 

So, on the topic of the show, how did you get involved? What drew you to this project?

Uh, I needed a job. No, I'm kidding. Long story short, I've been a child actor my entire life. Then I took a break from acting when I turned 19. I was like, “I feel insane I don't know why I’m doing this,” so I took a long break for like eight years and then I got back into it two years ago […] When I first got this audition, I was a glorified handyman in Los Angeles, and I had a project that I was working on, and I told my agent, “I can't do this because I have a job and it pays really well over the next couple days, and if I don't do this job, I'm not gonna pay my bills.” And she's just like, “just do the audition. Put the thing on tape.” Then I listened to the music that The Rescues wrote and I was just like “oh, this is a musical that I could get on board with.” I mean, you know, everyone loves Sondheim and traditional musical theater, but it's not my voice. I sing more rock and alternative; that’s exactly what The Rescues are. It’s more folk alternative, but like in Americana, which is me too. It just fit, and I just couldn't believe that there was music like this for a show.

That had to have felt so surreal.

Oh, 1000%. 1000%! Two years after taking a nine-year break and then all of a sudden Broadway calls, you're like, “this isn't real.” That's why I feel like it's all just a dream, I'm just gonna wake up. I feel like I'm living an out-of-body experience if that makes sense, but it's surreal. Every day I'm walking to the theater, I'm just doing a little gratitude walk. It can get a lot at times, so I’m just being grateful for Michael Arden, being grateful to my producers, grateful for our creative team, my cast. 

Before we dive too deep into Lost Boys, I wanna go back to summer when every single person in New York City wanted to be in LA at the Hollywood Bowl. You were doing Jesus Christ Superstar. I'm so curious about that experience and like the biggest lesson that you learned from that.

I grew up passing the Bowl every day on my way to auditions as a kid. So you always have that dream of being there. And then you go to watch a show there and you're like, “Man, this is so cool.” And then all of a sudden you're doing three sold-out performances and people are fighting to get their way in. Oh, by the way, Cynthia Erivo and Adam Lambert are leading it. It's like, what? 

A month later is when I booked Lost Boys, so that whole month, honestly this entire last year, has felt like a dream. A year prior I was doing TaskRabbit, a couple months earlier I was doing TaskRabbit and handymanning around LA. I had just got a truck thinking I’m doing handyman stuff. So to go from that to being in Jesus Christ Superstar at the Hollywood Bowl directed by Sergio [Trujillo] who is just a visionary. Then you work with Cynthia Erivo and Adam Lambert who just came in every day prepared. Then Raul Esparza who basically treated the rehearsal process like an acting camp. It just felt like the most expensive acting camp ever, but I was getting paid. 

I got to watch these superstars do what they love to do. I think the biggest thing I took away from it was just Cynthia had a lot on her shoulders. She would never say it, she would never come in like “oh this is hard.” We all knew that she just had the weight of the world and the weight of everyone's thoughts about her playing Jesus on her shoulders, but every day she came in like it was nothing. She understood the gravity of what we're about to do. I wish I could get in her brain — what brought that sense of peace and that sense of calm to the rehearsal room that made all of us just like mellow out. I mean, she played Jesus, so all of us were so willing to go with her to that place. She was super prepared. It was like acting 101. “If you're going to be leading a show, let's just make sure you show up prepared.” That’s exactly what you did and it was incredible. Same with Adam. 

A month after that whole insane experience, you book Lost Boys. What has been your favorite part of this rehearsal process?

The room has been really great in the sense of discovering who Michael is. Then also working with Shoshana Bean, Paul Alexander Nolan, Ben Crawford, Ali Louis Bourzgui, Maria [Wirries], and Benjamin [Pajak], who are all just pros. Their encouragement has meant more than anything. It feels like there’s some weight on my shoulders but honestly I just feel like I’m being carried throughout this entire thing by them in a crazy way. There's a lot of technical elements that we have in our show, so tech has been crazy in itself. All of us are watching what we're about to do, all the things the audience is about to experience. I'm just excited for people to see the show, honestly. No one's gonna expect what we are doing.

From our side, we're all very curious and very excited. Is there a particular thing that you're most excited to get a reaction to?

I mean, there's a pretty insane scene in the movie, so I can't, it's not really a spoiler, but let's just say people are hanging off a bridge and it's gonna be a really fun moment for the show, especially if you're in like the first couple rows.

When young folks come to see this show, you know, Gen Z-ers, what are you hoping that they might take away from it?

That's a good question. I remember seeing shows from when I was 12 to 15 to 19 to when I was 25, I feel like I had the same thought every single time, which was just like I felt like I could do more. I could accomplish anything after seeing a show, you know what I mean? I was just like, “oh the world's my oyster, like I can go do that if I really want to.” And I hope when they see our show and they see just the limits and the lines that we are crossing technically, physically. I don't want to give too much away, but I hope they watch our show, and they're like “that's possible? You could do that in live in musical theatre?” I just hope that like they become a Michael Arden and expand what musical theatre is as an experience, and they see someone like Shoshana Bean just freaking absolutely crushing and just running all over the place, and people like Benjamin. I hope they can dream a little bit bigger and they can go after those things that God's put on their heart and those dreams that they've had since they were kids that they can do it. 

You know, you can take a break from acting and figure out who you are and then you can get back into it. But I just feel like I remember when I watched shows when I left, I was like, “my gosh, there's so much waiting for me.” I hope that's what they feel.

You've mentioned a bunch, this whole thing has felt dreamlike. When you look back on this whole process, five, 10, 20 years from now, what do you want to remember?

I want to remember… that's difficult. There's two answers. What I want to remember are the relationships I made and cultivated, and the shared experience and conversations outside the show that we're putting on. Those relationships, in my opinion, are more important than any show you ever put on because those are the real people doing it, and those relationships last longer than any other show I'll ever do. But I hope the legacy that I leave is just somebody that served more than they took. If that makes sense. I feel like there's this stigma on lead actors, lead whatever, that they're the ones being catered to the most. And I hope I, as someone who's brand new to this, can kind of flip it on its head and be known as a person that served more than I received. Plus, doing the stunts for the first time. You know, flying 65 feet in the air… I'll definitely remember that.

My last question for you, on a rogue day off, which I'm sure you just have infinitely many of, what else do you want to see this season?

Oh, good question. Oh my goodness, oh my goodness. You know, I just watched, I think it was like a Reel of Cats' [The Jellicle Ball’s] first preview, and like that looks just like so much fun. I also really want to go see Hadestown just because that kind of music I totally love and sit with. I want to go see Masquerade. Phantom is my favorite musical of all time, so being able to go see that rendition of it would be super, super sick. Also, I really just want to go see the Celtics play the Knicks, being so real. I really want to go to Madison Square Garden to see a game. I want to go see the Red Sox and Yankees play, that would be so great.

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