Trust Me, You Will Want To Know Ainsley Melham

There is one thing for certain, when director Jerry Mitchell compares his leading man to Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire, it’s safe to assume they are pretty talented. Enter Ainsley Melham. 

Growing up in Australia, Melham has made a name for himself in the Land Down Under playing lead roles in everything from Merrily We Roll Along to Wicked to The Normal Heart, and trust me this list goes on and on and on. After landing the leading role of Dwayne in Boop! The Musical now on Broadway, Melham is getting his chance to truly shine. 

I recently caught up with Melham after opening night to chat all things Boop, catching one of those iconic red balloons, and finding himself in Dwayne.

‍Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity. All photography was shot on film by Carianne Older for Theatrely.

Theatrely: So how was opening night last week?

Melham: Oh my gosh, it was wonderful and so, so thrilling. I had my family there all the way from Australia. You know, this is my first opening on Broadway...I was here with Aladdin, but stepped into the cast as a replacement in Aladdin. Such an exciting night.

I'm curious, what was your history with Betty Boop as a character before stepping into this project?

We know who Betty Boop is in Australia but she's much more part of the cultural fabric of this country. And so when I heard about the project and got the brief, I was like, “Oh, this is interesting. I wonder how this sort of show will hit with audiences.” Even if you don't know much about the history of Betty Boop, you certainly know the character and perhaps what she stands for. And that's all you really need to know coming into this show because everything else is new and we get to you with a new story and new music.

I think it's so refreshing for a leading man on Broadway to be a true triple threat — we just don’t see it anymore. It's just a thrill to watch. So I want to dive into the character of Dwayne. Tell me, to start out, how did you land the role? 

I sort of made the move permanently here at the top of 2023 in March. I'd been back and forth for a while doing Aladdin and other projects, but I nailed down the Green Card and made the decision to move permanently. I knew Jerry and went into the room, sang the material, and I think it was a week and a half later and I heard I had received an offer. Dwayne is not a character in the Betty Boop canon; he's not a Fleischer Studios character. So he's completely new in this musical. It gave me room to fully realize him in a way that felt true and real to me. And in reality, he's just a guy, he's a young musician, you know, trying to carve out his way in New York City. So it's not unlike my own story as a young actor trying to carve out a space. 

I want to circle back to that for a second, but when you decided to make the move here full time, was that for work purposes? Was it to pursue a career on Broadway?

Yeah, it was for work. You know, I worked for about 10 years really successfully in Australia. And then Disney brought me here with Aladdin. In that situation, it's very specific. You're brought here on an entertainment visa and you are contracted to the show. And so part of my decision to come back with the Green Card was to come back unattached to anything just to see where that would lead me. I'm obviously very grateful to Disney and the opportunities that they provided, but I wanted to come back and be part of something original. And to do that, I had to come back on my own and take that risk in a way to see if I could land something. I'm really happy and glad that it paid off. So this was definitely a move for the career and I hope that I can stay here for a little while and see what New York has to offer. 

Were you always a lover of jazz, or was that a newfound thing with Dwayne?

I've always been a lover of that style. I've been a tap dancer since I was very young. And so tap and jazz like this go sort of hand in hand really. So jazz has always been a part of my life and a part of my regular sort of playlist. But doing the show and stepping into this character has certainly allowed me to dive deeper into that, which is exciting.

Did you know how to play the trumpet or did they give you lessons before hopping on the stage?

I did not know how to play the trumpet at all. I had some lessons to get me up to speed, but like anything, that's a skill that you work on from when you're very young. It's a hard thing to try and emulate every night, but I'm doing my best! When someone comes up to me at the stage door and tells me I played wonderfully, I know I'm doing something right! 

Obviously Bob Martin is a genius musical comedy writer. I'm curious how much of—since Dwayne is not in the canon of Boop—how much of yourself did you put into the character?

They were so generous and collaborative when it came to everyone in the cast, even Jasmine as Betty, which is such a realized and popular character. But for Dwayne, the team was really open and welcoming of ideas for this character. I came to this city because I was missing something and that wasn't really in the character of Dwyane—it was something Bob and I really discussed. 

And then I'm curious on the flip side of that, is there something that the character of Dwayne has taught you? 

I think he has taught me to trust myself more on stage because there is so much of myself in this character that can be quite scary and vulnerable. And because Dwayne is sort of the most real or natural character in this show, amongst all of these more heightened and cartoonish characters, it can sometimes feel a bit exposing to stand up there and trust that what you're doing is enough when you're delivering a performance that is—it feels weird to say naturalistic in the music theater world—but that is more natural than Betty Boop and Grampy and all of these other characters. So I guess Dwayne has taught me to trust in myself, Ainsley the actor, and know that what he's delivering is enough.

Tell me about collaborating with David Foster, who I personally think has written one of the cachiest scores in recent memory. 

I mean, David Foster has produced for just the most incredible people, one of whom is Michael Bublé. Bublé was one of the artists that I listened to from young because he was emulating and paying homage to those crooners of the 30s and 40s, whom I love so much. So then stepping into a room with David and singing this sort of music, which feels so jazz and big band inspired, is incredible. And then we were in Chicago. When we were in Chicago, we added a song for Dwayne, She Knocks Me Out. And so David wrote this song over the weekend and came in and said, here I've written you your Bublé song, which is insane. You would have told a little boy from Bathurst County, Australia, that he'd be working with David Foster and he'd get his own Michael Bublé song. It's pretty incredible. 

When you think about that you are starring in a big Broadway musical and on the press tour Jerry Mitchell is out there comparing you to Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, wow does that sit with you as an actor? Obviously it's high praise and extremely well-deserved, but how does it feel?

I have a lot of beautiful friends around me who keep reminding me of that fact—they'll text me or when I speak to them, they're like, “Ainsley, you're doing the thing that we all aim for in one way or another, you're originating the role and you're going it so beautifully and he's comparing you to Gene Kelly, like what the hell?” So it's in those moments, I think, that sometimes it takes somebody else to go, “Hey, just take a breath and realize,” because you can get caught up in it. You get caught in the process, you put a lot of pressure and stress on yourself and you can sometimes lose sight of the fun and the pinch me moment of it. But in those moments where I do reflect, it feels... it feels really... you know, I've danced and sung and worked in this way since I was very, very young. Since I was three years old, I had tap shoes on my feet and I've idolized those sorts of figures all through my childhood and through my professional career. So to have somebody like Jerry turn around and make that comparison, it sort of doesn't feel real sometimes.

I think my favorite part of your preview process were the balloons outside that you could just see all around Midtown. Did you ever take a balloon?

Oh my gosh, yes. And you know, as I was walking home the other day, halfway up 9th Avenue, I walked past a brownstone and I could see a balloon just in the living room, through the window. And I was like, “Oh my gosh, that person's been at the show!” These balloons are finding themselves all over Manhattan. It's really cool.

The show is such a lovely love letter to New York City. I'm curious, where do you find yourself on days off?

That's a good question. Well, you know, I live so close to Central Park, I'm just a couple of blocks away. That's usually how I start my day or if I have a day off, I'll go and sit in the park. It probably seems extremely touristy. But you know I lived and grew up in Australia and spent much time in Sydney where we have direct access to the beach and to beautiful nature reserves all around us. So Central Park for me is my dose of that.

The thing that I think is undisputed about this production is that Jasmine Amy Rodgers is really cementing herself as a true bonafide Broadway star. I'm curious, what is it like to watch her journey through your eyes on stage every night opposite her?

Jasmine offstage is such a clown, and we get along like brother and sister. So in that way, it's sort of unbelievable and hard to resolve the fact that this sort of clownish, goofy, you-know, little sister type offstage is stepping on stage and delivering this absolutely incredible star-making performance. Not that I doubt it from her, but when you stand back and watch from the sidelines, you're like, “Oh, wow, this is really incredible. Where was she pulling this from inside of her?” I'm so thrilled that this show came along and was met with Jasmine's talent because she is the character, she is Betty Boop. When you hear her laugh in real life, it's the same laugh you hear on stage, you know? There's so much of her in Betty. And it just took a vehicle like this for people to see it and realize it. And now I'm excited, not that I'm wishing this experience away, but I am excited to see where it goes from here, because it's only art. 

When someone looks at your resume, I'm sure it's a resume that young actors aspire to. I'm curious, what advice do you have for young folks who want to get into the business and start a career that looks like yours?

When people ask me that question, I always say that you just need to stand firm in what makes you you in the audition room, what you have to offer. I don't really see myself—this might seem odd from someone on the outside looking in—but I don't really see myself as the particularly strong, tall, leading man type. When I was doing Wicked, I would step onto the stage as Fiyero and half the ensemble was taller than I am and traditionally they cast really tall, strapping guys in in that role and so here I am going, “Okay, well I'm playing this role which is really cool but it sort of it feels a little bit, you know, against time aesthetically,” if you will. But, you know, I'm trusting that whatever I'm bringing as Ainsley is enough. So, you can't be like anyone else. You're never going to. People can see through it so easily. So, for young people, I think they need to find their point of view and just stand firm in that.

When you wrap up Boop and you're reflecting back in five, ten, twenty years, what do you want to remember most about this time right now? 

Oh gosh. Um... I think just how happy we make people. You can sort of get caught up in the politics and in what people think, what critics think, which casting people are in the audience and what would they think of my performance and will it be enough to get me the next gig or whatever. But when we stand up there at the end of each show and the whole audience is on their feet and they're all singing and smiling — it's so joyous. I mean, that's really what we're there to do. It's why we go back each night. It's why we stay in this career, to move people. And for this, in this show, we're moving them to such beautiful joy. And so I think I want to remember that. 

Before we go, I have to ask, if you were at Comic Con, who would you dress up as? 

Oh my gosh. Well, I have sort of two options. It would either be like a Studio Ghibli character, maybe Howl from Howl's Moving Castle?? Or I have always loved Sailor Moon!