NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

‘Scorpion’ actress Katharine McPhee heading to Broadway

NEW YORK

Actress Katharine McPhee has already played someone who stars in a Broadway show. Now she’s really going to do it herself.

The singer-actress told The Associated Press that she is stepping into the hit musical “Waitress,” marking the Broadway debut for the former cast member of NBC’s “Smash.” She starts April 10 and stars through June 17.

“People come up to me all the time and say, ‘You’ve done Broadway, right?’ And I’m like, ‘Nope, I’ve never done it,’” McPhee said. “I did a show about it, but I was never, in fact, on Broadway. So this is really my first moment.”

McPhee, 33, can be seen on the CBS drama “Scorpion,” where she helps a group of misfit geniuses combat high-tech threats.

Her recording career includes the 2015 album “Hysteria,” and she sings jazz standards on “I Fall in Love Too Easily,” which came out last year.

McPhee, who was the runner-up to the 2006 “American Idol” crown, losing to Taylor Hicks, also starred in “Smash,” which focused on the backstage drama surrounding the creation of a Broadway musical about Marilyn Monroe.

McPhee played Karen Cartwright, a small-town girl from Iowa who becomes a serious contender for the title role, putting her in fierce competition with seasoned Broadway trouper Ivy Linn, played by Megan Hilty.

Dunham pens essay about undergoing hysterectomy at 31

LOS ANGELES

Lena Dunham has written an incredibly personal essay about coming to terms with permanent infertility at age 31.

Vogue.com published Dunham’s detailed account Wednesday of her decision to undergo a hysterectomy late last year to relieve what she describes as debilitating pain from endometriosis.

The award-winning creator of “Girls” and LennyLetter.com also shares her profound desire to experience pregnancy and become a mother and her grief around losing her fertility. She says dealing with endometriosis distanced her from her romantic partner. Dunham and musician Jack Antonoff announced in January that they had ended their five-year relationship.

Dunham says she has known all her life that “something is wrong with my uterus” and has had nine surgeries to cope with endometriosis since her diagnosis 10 years ago.

Associated Press