It’s been a nearly a quarter-century since viewers watched Kelly Clarkson triumph over runner-up Justin Guarini in the debut season of “American Idol.”
Since then, Guarini has gone on to carve out a successful career on Broadway, and is sharing the lessons he’s learned along the way in his new book, “Center Stage Confidence: How to Own Your Story and Command Any Room.”
A ‘Fork in the Road Moment’
While discussing his book during an interview with People, Guarini looked back on a defining moment in the early stages of his career, when he was faced with a difficult decision that would ultimately determine his future path.
“I had this fork in the road moment in 2002, where for years earlier I had been auditioning for this little show nobody’s ever heard of called ‘The Lion King,’” Guarini joked of the hit Broadway musical based on the animated Disney classic.
“And I never quite got cast for it. Always close, but not quite. Then, this show called ‘American Idol’ comes along,” he recalled.
“I get this yellow piece of paper that they tell me is a golden ticket, before they actually started making golden ticket tickets,” he added. “And so I’m sitting in my car, I’m just outside my work at the time, and I get this phone call from the casting director from ‘Lion King.’ They say, ‘Hey, we finally got the role for you. When can you start Broadway? It’s going to be your debut.’”
A Dream Role on Broadway
Guarini admitted he was dumbstruck by the timing of that offer, and decided to lay it all out to the musical’s casting director.
“I said, ‘Well, there’s this show out in LA, I might get cut. But let me call you in a week. I might get cut. Let me just call you in a week and we’ll see what happens,'” Guarini remembered, explaining it all came to a head during Hollywood Week.
“A week goes by, and its one of the most grueling weeks in ‘American Idol,’ and I realize I have to make a decision,” he shared.
“And so I’m walking down the aisle and I see the ‘American Idol’ logo, and all the people who are just as exhausted as I am, who are my friends, but also my competitors, the judges’ dais, the lights, everything. And I just start crying,” he admitted. “And I want to hide my face, because I don’t want the cameras to catch me crying because, who knows how they’ll spin it? And I just stop in that moment and I listen, and this little voice says, ‘Do this,’ meaning ‘American Idol.’”
Trusting His Instincts
He decided to listen to that small voice, and turned down “The Lion King” in order to continue his “American Idol” journey.
“I had no idea what was going to happen. I wasn’t even in the top 30. They hadn’t even gotten there yet. I just trusted that what had gotten me to that place would get me where I needed to go. And that was a moment of beautiful divine confidence for me,” he says. “So I called [the casting director] and said, ‘Thank you so very much. Please keep me in mind for the future,’” he said.
Years later, Guarini’s Broadway dreams came true when he finally made his debut on the Great White Way in the 2010 musical “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.”
“Ten years after my ‘American Idol’ audition, I find myself at the opening night party of my very first Broadway show,” he recalled. “And I look around the room and I’m like, ‘Oh, my goodness, this is the hotel and the conference room where I first auditioned for ‘American Idol.’ It was this beautiful cyclical experience of just having faith and trusting in the process and trusting in what got me to where I needed to go, and ultimately, it would get me where I wanted to be.”
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Justin Guarini Recalls Turning Down Dream Role on Broadway for ‘American Idol’