Shailene Woodley joins the Broadway family with 'Cult of Love'

The Emmy Award-nominated Big Little Lies actress makes her Broadway debut in Leslye Headland's drama about an extended family's Christmas dinner gone wrong.

Shailene Woodley is making her Broadway debut in Cult of Love, a family drama that's stuffed with explosive fighting. Luckily, the dynamic between the cast members is the total opposite off stage.

"Everyone is so complimentary and kind and generous to one another," Woodley said at Cult of Love's opening night. "There's a lot of grace for the ups and downs and trials and tribulations that come with being a newbie in this arena."

Her co-stars include high-profile Broadway veterans like Zachary Quinto and Mare Winningham, plus fellow first-timers like Barbie Ferreira and Woodley's onstage husband, Christopher Lowell. Together, the 10-person cast makes up the extended Dahl family, whose Christmas dinner goes wildly awry in Leslye Headland's play.

Woodley comes to Cult of Love on a break from her prolific screen career: After rising to fame in young adult dramas like the TV show The Secret Life of the American Teenager and the movie The Fault in Our Stars, she earned an Emmy nomination and widespread acclaim for her performance in HBO's Big Little Lies. She stretches her dramatic chops further in Cult of Love as Diana Dahl, a young mother whose staunch religious beliefs — and associated prejudices — cause tension between her and her siblings, all while she struggles with her own mental health.

"She's complicated because we're all complicated," Woodley said of her character. "It's so easy to judge a book by its cover, and I wanted to bring some compassion and and understanding to someone that could easily be very misunderstood."

"All we do as actors is, hopefully, bring truth to the characters and stories we get to play," she continued.

Not only does she appreciate the support from her castmates in this endeavor, but from audiences, too. To hear theatregoers respond to the action in real time, she said, is her favorite thing about performing on Broadway that she doesn't get in Hollywood. As the Hayes Theater, where Cult of Love is playing through February 2, is Broadway's smallest venue, it all but puts audiences right into the Dahls' chaos-filled living room.

I love when I hear people laughing. I love when I hear people gasping," Woodley said. "The audience feels like they're a character in the play, and that's very special."

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Photo credit: Shailene Woodley in Cult of Love on Broadway. (Photo by Joan Marcus)