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\u201cHow did you get to be here?\u201d It\u2019s the question Jonathan Groff<\/strong> asks himself eight times a week in the Broadway revival of Merrily We Roll Along.<\/em> Before the musical\u2019s most recent production, Merrily<\/em> was infamous in certain circles as one of theater icon Stephen Sondheim\u2019s rare missteps\u2014a structurally complicated show whose original 1981 Broadway production closed after just 16 performances. Now, more than four decades later, Groff and his close-knit main costars, Lindsay Mendez<\/strong> and Daniel Radcliffe<\/strong><\/a>,<\/strong> have made Merrily We Roll Along<\/em> into a bona fide hit, with all three earning Tony nominations in the process.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been almost two years now with the same group of actors all working together on Merrily,<\/em>\u201d says Groff on Little Gold Men<\/em> this week (listen below). \u201cWe\u2019ve all just completely fallen in love with each other. There\u2019s a deep bond with the company.\u201d<\/p>\n In conversation with VF<\/em>\u2019s Richard Lawson,<\/strong> Groff talks Merrily<\/em> as well as his childhood in rural Pennsylvania and his Tony-nominated performance as Melchior Gabor in Spring Awakening.<\/em> Rather than joining Lea Michele<\/a>,<\/strong> his Spring Awakening<\/em> costar and bestie<\/a>, on Ryan Murphy<\/strong>\u2019s Glee,<\/em> Groff opted to stay in the theater world. \u201cI really felt like I didn\u2019t want to sign on to be a singing teenager again for another seven years, which I had just done for two years in Spring Awakening,<\/em>\u201d he tells Lawson.<\/p>\n Of course, Groff would eventually make his way to Glee<\/em> in a recurring role as heartthrob Jesse St. James, and go on to make a bigger splash as Patrick, the lovelorn protagonist in Looking,<\/em> Andrew Haigh<\/strong>\u2019s groundbreaking queer series. He\u2019s taken on a diverse array of film and television roles in the years since, from top-billing David Fincher<\/strong>\u2019s period crime drama, Mindhunter,<\/em> to voicing Kristoff in Disney\u2019s Frozen,<\/em> to starring in M. Night Shyamalan<\/strong>\u2019s horror film Knock at the Cabin.<\/em> Still, Groff has always managed to return to his theater roots. In 2016, he earned a second Tony nod for originating the role of King George III in the Broadway production of a little show called Hamilton;<\/em> now, he\u2019s nominated for his third Tony for Merrily.<\/em> Below, Groff opens up about his \u201cchildhood obsession\u201d with Sondheim, moving to New York to be an actor, and choosing the art over money.<\/p>\n Vanity Fair:<\/em> I saw you on one of the late-night shows, and you said that when the nominations were announced, you were very emotional about it. Is there anything about Merrily We Roll Along<\/em> or this role that feels important in a particular way?<\/strong><\/p>\n Jonathan Groff:<\/em> Oh, God. I think it\u2019s a laundry list of things. I don\u2019t know if it\u2019s one particular thing. It\u2019s probably a combination of listening to the original cast of Company<\/em> while I shoveled horse shit out of my dad\u2019s horse stalls when I was a teenager; he\u2019s a horse trainer. Growing up in Pennsylvania and being obsessed with Sondheim musicals and reading a Sondheim biography during this high school science fair\u2014I\u2019ve got this childhood obsession with his work.<\/p>\n On top of all that, it\u2019s been almost two years now with the same group of actors all working together on Merrily.<\/em> We\u2019ve all just completely fallen in love with each other. So there\u2019s a deep bond with the company.<\/p>\n And then this show was a flop 40-plus years ago. Honestly, I can never tire of talking about it, because it just feels like a miracle that this show has come back after decades away from its original Broadway premiere. Now here it is, and it\u2019s got seven Tony nominations. At this point, monetarily, the show has become a hit, which is difficult historically for Sondheim shows in general\u2014even the shows that have been, like, artistic and critical hits of his. That monetary hit, it\u2019s why he\u2019s writing about it so much so deep into his career in Merrily.<\/em> That was always really important to him and meant something to him. In some ways, it was the thing that often eluded him. To be inside of this production of Merrily<\/em> as a hit is just, like, so surreal and so cool and so emotional.<\/p>\n The line I always heard was that Sondheim wanted Andrew Lloyd Webber\u2019s box office, and Andrew Lloyd Webber wanted Sondheim\u2019s reviews. The two coming together is very rare.<\/strong><\/p>\n [Laughs<\/em>] Wow, that\u2019s so funny.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a great documentary about the original production\u2014people who were involved in it reflecting on this beautiful dream that didn\u2019t quite work out. All these years later, there have been other productions here and there, but nothing on the scale of your show. How heavy was the responsibility to get it right and honor, or change, the legacy of this beloved but also kind of fraught production history?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n