Of course everyone knows Sarah Jessica Parker and Cynthia Nixon were co-stars on Sex and the City, but did you know that they’ve known each other since they were kids? In fact, the two of them used to compete for roles together as working actors on the New York stage.
At Vulture Festival on Sunday, Parker told New York magazine editor-in-chief Adam Moss about her early years on the audition circuit after scoring a role in a Harold Pinter play on Broadway. “Cynthia Nixon and I were always in a waiting room together,†she said. “She got a lot of the parts and rightfully so. I love her and admire her even more today, and I’ve known her since she was 11.â€
Parker says that she was one of the few people who auditioned both for plays and for musicals, mostly because “I didn’t know I shouldn’t be doing both.†She says the musical-audition circuit was “high energy, nervous making, competitive … and it’s brutal.†But the world of “straight plays†was very different. “It is quiet and contemplative,†she said, “just like Cynthia Nixon.â€