Inside the Roundabout Theatre Company’s One-Night-Only Benefit Concert With Kristin Chenoweth

The team who organized the Roundabout Theatre Company’s one-night-only benefit concert after-party at the Bryant Park Grill on Monday night must have gambled that the weather would be balmy enough to use the indoor-outdoor space’s twinkle-lit exterior. It was a risk that paid off, and they were surely emboldened by the fact their headliner, Kristin Chenoweth, is one you can always bank on.

Kristin: An Evening with Friends for Todd saw the beloved performer pay tribute to Todd Haimes, Roundabout’s longtime artistic director and CEO, who passed away last April, leaving behind a trail of Tonys. Haimes had turned the company from a tiny operation in the basement of a Chelsea grocery store into one of the country’s largest nonprofit theaters, and a favorite for its stable of often-returning stage actors. The company’s Broadway house on 42nd Street was renamed in his honor earlier this year.

Taking over the Stephen Sondheim Theater, the night featured performances from Roundabout alumni Jane Krakowski, Vanessa Williams, Kelli O’Hara, Peter Gallagher, Victoria Clarke, Debra Monk, and a tap-dancing Corbin Bleu. The star, though, was Chenoweth, who at one point brought out her young guitarist husband to accompany her rewrite of The Beatles’ “Yesterday,” now about her complicated relationship with a certain chicken restaurant (“Chik-fil-a, why’d you have to go and hate my gays?”).

The pint-sized soprano was outfitted in a series of sparkly evening looks from Christian Cowan (who’s costuming her Broadway-bound musical, The Queen of Versailles), Christian Siriano, and Pamella Roland, culminating in a sharp alice + olivia pantsuit, equal parts boardroom serious and Dolly Parton (read: cleavage-forward). That’s the one she wore to the after-party, where the ever-polite Oklahoman played host to Roundabout’s many, many attending donors. Doing her gracious rounds took up most of her time, visiting each place-carded table while her fellow performers (and Dylan Mulvaney) reminisced about their fallen leader in a prime location on the venue’s veranda.

Monday is typically an off night in the theater world, and this one represented the calm before a particularly chaotic storm: there will be twelve Broadway openings between April 17 and 25, when Tony eligibility is cut off. Die-hards, like a mother who told Vogue she’d flown in from Toronto with her daughter to catch a few of these shows, flock to Midtown West for the occasion.

Vogue asked Krakowski, who had earlier dueted a cheeky riff on Mame’s “Bosom Buddies” with Chenoweth, and can be seen at many an opening night red carpet, whether she planned on dropping into any: “Oh no, I’m going to Milan tomorrow… for the Salone.” Chic.