The Prom already made history in November when two performers from the show shared the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade’s first same-sex kiss. And on Saturday, August 3, the Tony-winning Broadway musical made history again by hosting Broadway’s first known on-stage wedding, per The Advocate… and a lesbian wedding at that!
The newlyweds? Armelle Kay Harper, a script coordinator for the show, and Jody Kay Smith, an actress and singer who recently worked with the show’s musical director. The guests? The entire cast of The Prom, plus about 1,000 Longacre Theatre audience members who didn’t know they’d be attending a wedding that night, according to The New York Times.
Harper tells the newspaper she had just left a rehearsal in 2017 when she opened Bumble and found Smith’s profile. The lovebirds started chatting, and Smith was taken by Harper’s sense of humor.
“We’re both really witty people, and it’s hard to find someone who can keep up,” Harper adds. “But she really got me, and she made me laugh. Plus those blue eyes. What can you do? Gorgeous.”
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They got serious very quickly — so quickly, in fact, that Smith proposed to Harper 19 days after they met. Bob Martin, one of the writers of The Prom, came up with the idea of the wedding. “He said, ‘Well, I’ve married people onstage before, so if you wanted to just get it over with and do it at curtain call, we can do that,’” Smith says.
And the setting was perfect for the couple: The show, which is being adapted for the screen by Ryan Murphy, focuses on a lesbian couple in Indiana who campaign to attend prom together.
“There are so many shows where lesbians are secondary characters or the butt of the joke,” Harper tells the Times. “We all love Fun Home, but it’s a drama. So The Prom is really unique in that it’s a celebration, and it’s funny without being at the expense of lesbians. It’s just so much joy.”
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Now the couple is getting ready for a larger ceremony in Smith’s hometown next month. Harper says that she grew up in an “incredibly homophobic” environment and that most of her family won’t be attending their ceremony next month.
“Even coming from that background, I’ve never felt a pinch of regret or shame,” she says. “Loving Jody is worth everything. And being myself is worth everything.”
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Ryan99
I wish them the best, but proposing 19 days after meeting is nuts.
bowlingbutch
Proposed 19 days after meeting? hmmm, why wait so long? I am so happy we can get married now but how about really getting to know someone before proposing? Growing up in the 60’s and 70’s I never thought about marriage because I didn’t imagine it would be legal during my lifetime. Let’s not forget that we fought for this right and it really is a serious commitment. I do wish them good wishes and hope they are together for years.