“That was really, really devastating because suddenly this role was taken from me-when it went away, I didn’t know who I was anymore,” Urie says. Then, abruptly, Urie says, he was forced to reaudition a rights holder hadn’t approved his casting, even though it was supposedly finalized.

His breakout was past and his future was bright. Urie was cast in the Broadway revival of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying right after Ugly Betty finished, primed to make his big debut on the Great White Way. How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. “There was a character that just said, ‘bitchy, gay assistant,’ and I was like, I bet I could get that,” Urie says. While doing a basement play, he bumped into the casting director for Ugly Betty, who was impressed he decided to audition on that pilot for a mere “costar” credit (as in, below “guest star”) that Urie says paid about $3,000. There was a model for that in a Sean.” ( Will & Grace was at the height of its popularity around this time.) Within a year of graduating, Urie played a gay best friend in a filmed pilot, which put him on the sitcom radar. He attracted a “really good” agent and manager who found him a specific lane. In the transition from student to professional, he wasn’t auditioning for, say, Law and Order-the typical entry-level New York stuff. Hiding was not exactly an option for Urie, even though few actors were publicly out at the time. That’s what he said.” They went their separate ways. “It was obvious what he was getting at was, You’re a homo. That’s what he meant. “He stopped me and he was like, ‘See, that hand gesture? Just not sure,’” Urie recalls, acting out the scene for me over Zoom. Urie pitched himself as someone who could do it all. The manager took Urie out for coffee and told him he could almost see Robin Williams, a comedy legend in waiting, but that he needed a tad more convincing to sign him. He was funny-really funny-and caught the eye of a manager nabbing talent from his class (which also included Jessica Chastain and Luke Macfarlane). Just before graduating from Juilliard in 2003, Urie says, he performed in a show for the famed arts conservatory and cracked the audience up.

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