On a recent afternoon in New York, Sydney James Harcourt was doing what he always does before a big Broadway moment: resting.

“I can’t go out,” he says with a laugh that suggests he wouldn’t want to anyway. “One, because I can’t be up that late. I’ve got to get up at dawn and go to the gym. And two, every bar is a super-spreader event, and I can’t be sick. You can’t stay healthy without sleep. For me, it’s common sense.”

Discipline, he insists, isn’t deprivation. “I don’t feel that it’s an imposition in any way. It’s kept me youthful. It keeps my body the way I want it. The discipline has only made everything in my life better. It serves my voice.”

That voice, rich, elastic, capable of sliding from classical soprano lines to contemporary pop riffs, helped earn him a Grammy as a featured artist on Hamilton. It also helped cement his reputation as one of Broadway’s most dynamic performers. Now, the Detroit-born actor, singer and dancer is stepping into one of musical theater’s most iconic roles: Rum Tum Tugger in the reimagined Broadway production of CATS, officially titled CATS: The Jellicle Ball, debuting April 7 with previews beginning March 18, and produced by Michael Harrison, Mike Bosner, as well as Cynthia Erivo, Billy Porter, LaChanze, Jeremy Pope, and Lena Waithe.

And this isn’t your childhood, Cats.

Set within the world of ballroom culture, the new production folds voguing and house traditions into Andrew Lloyd Webber’s global phenomenon. For Harcourt, a Grammy winner, LGBTQ+ advocate, and member of the House of Oricci, the concept feels personal.

“The hook for me initially was that they were setting it in the ballroom community,” he says. “I always wanted theater to be current. And what I saw in this revival, adding ballroom and voguing to the mix, I thought, I have to be part of this.”

From Detroit to Discipline

Harcourt’s journey to Broadway began far from Times Square. Raised in Detroit by an English teacher mother and a piano prodigy father, he was steeped in music from an early age. “My mom put me in piano lessons. My dad was a piano prodigy. They thought I was going to have the same gift,” he recalls. “I really liked it. I played classical piano. But singing felt like magic.”

As a teenager, he auditioned for Interlochen Arts Academy in Northern Michigan and received a full scholarship in classical voice. Instead of a traditional gym class, he signed up for general dance.

“I auditioned for The Nutcracker to be a party parent,” he says, grinning. “But one of the larger guys tore his rotator cuff, and they asked if I’d be willing to learn the partnering for the Arabian pas de deux. Of course, I said yes. Adventure is kind of my thing.”

He was hooked.

“I grew up overweight in school. I never went to a school dance. So, to suddenly be on stage, dancing on such a large scale, it was intoxicating.”

Harcourt became Interlochen’s first-ever double major in voice and dance, spending mornings in academics, afternoons in voice lessons, and evenings in dance rehearsals six days a week.

“That’s where the discipline began,” he says. “Being around dancers who constantly have to stretch, who aren’t allowed to go skiing because if you get hurt, you’re out of the show. That level of commitment shaped me.”

A Ballroom Calling

When Harcourt eventually left school, sold his car, and moved to New York as a teenager, he was chasing the dream of Broadway. But he was also discovering himself.

“I’m this gay kid who’s never experienced gay culture,” he says. “The first thing I started doing when I didn’t have a job was exploring club life. That’s where I got my first taste of voguing.”

In Michigan, there had been no ballroom scene for him. In New York, he watched dancers take over club floors at 1:30 and 2 a.m., executing “death-defying and awe-inspiring” moves.

“There was nowhere to learn this except the clubs,” he says. “I wasn’t involved in the houses at first. I had just moved here by myself. I didn’t have community. So, the club was where I could go and dance and learn.”

So, when his agents called about Cats, “They were like, ‘I’ve got an audition for you. It’s for Cats. But I think you’re going to like it because they’re doing it ballroom,’” he didn’t hesitate.

“I was on the next flight to New York in my cuntiest outfit,” he says, laughing. “Arturo looked at me and said, ‘You look like you’re going to the Beyoncé Renaissance tour. You got a ticket? Can I go with you?”

For the first time in an audition room, Harcourt felt fully seen. “In other rooms, I felt like I had to hide parts of who I really am. In this room, they wanted to see all of me.”

A New Rum Tum Tugger

Tony buzz has already started to build around Harcourt due to his stellar performance when he originated the role of Rum Tum Tugger in the critically acclaimed off-Broadway production of CATS: The Jellicle Ball at the Perelman Performing Arts Center in 2024.

Rum Tum Tugger has long been the show’s sexy showboat, all lip-licking bravado and pelvic thrusts. Harcourt’s interpretation, however, leans into ballroom’s “pretty boy realness” category.

“There’s a sensuality and a confidence,” he explains. “But it’s more subtle. It’s, ‘No, no, no. You come to me. I don’t need to come to you.’”

His archetypes? “Prince, George Michael, Usher, kind of the child the three of them might have had,” he says. “For me, they embody what’s hot about male pop, what drives everybody wild.”

The production team encouraged him to bring his authentic self to the role. “One of the best notes I got was, ‘Put more of who you are into it. You don’t have to try to do anything.’ That was scary. On Broadway, you feel like you have to be doing something or they’ll be bored. But sometimes when you do less and let them come to you, that’s the most magnetizing thing.”

Even Melissa McCarthy noticed. After attending an early performance, the actress asked to meet him backstage.

“She said, ‘I couldn’t take my eyes off of you. I was taking notes the entire time, how subtle what you were doing was.’ For me, that’s what it’s about. Draw everyone in, keep it subtle, keep it sexy, still keep it Rum Tum Tugger.”

Bigger Than Hamilton?

Harcourt, an original Broadway company member of Hamilton who stepped in as Aaron Burr after Leslie Odom Jr. in a career-changing triumph, doesn’t shy away from bold predictions about The Jellicle Ball.

“I can’t say I feel the same Hamilton vibe,” he says carefully. “I feel this is going to be so much bigger. I don’t say that lightly.”

Why? “It’s breaking so many ceilings. It’s so firmly rooted in what’s happening in the world, in civil rights, in personal freedoms. The talent, diversity, and love for one another in this cast and creative team are unparalleled. And it’s already a property people love worldwide. To take something that’s been a staple and give it a battle cry, give it a new meaning, an anthem for resistance, for self-empowerment, I think it will resonate in a way Hamilton couldn’t.”

Becoming the first Black Rum Tum Tugger on Broadway is not lost on him. “Sometimes it’s bigger than I can really take in,” he admits.

World Domination (Naturally)

In between eight shows a week, Harcourt is dreaming bigger. “In the words of Madonna, world domination,” he says, smiling.

He has written an entire album and plans to release new music. He’s studying acting intensively, building toward film and television roles after appearances on Blue Bloods, Law & Order, Elementary, and Doc.

On the Netflix series Castlevania: Nocturne, he voices Edouard, a mixed-race countertenor who sings Monteverdi and Purcell arias while navigating the supernatural, a full-circle nod to his classical roots.

“I try to pick things that speak to who I am and the path I’ve come through,” he says.

He’s also developing a film project about Burt Williams, one of America’s first Black mega-stars and possibly its first Black millionaire, whose legacy was complicated by performing in blackface. “His story is poignant,” Harcourt says. “It just speaks to me.”

Behind it all is gratitude, especially for his mother. “She sacrificed everything so I could try to live my dream,” he says. “I told her I was dropping out of school and moving to New York, and she supported me. She never wavered. So I’m determined to push this as far as it will go.”

For now, that push leads to The Jellicle Ball and an invitation.

“You’re going to have to dress up,” he teases about attending the show. “You’d better turn a look.”

In Harcourt’s world, discipline is devotion, vulnerability is power, and the ball is just beginning.

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