Article
March 30, 2026
Written by Student Writer Austin Watts
A Musical Homecoming: Alumnus and Colorado Native to Lead Next to Normal in Denver
Aléna Watters brings her Broadway career home, taking on the leading role of Diana at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts.
For Musical Theatre alumnus Aléna Watters, ‘03, the stage has always been a place of discovery, but her latest role as Diana Goodman in the Denver Center for the Performing Arts’ (DCPA) production of Next to Normal feels like a profound homecoming.
Raised in Colorado Springs, Watters has spent the past two decades navigating the heights of the entertainment industry. Her journey from the 2009 revival of West Side Story to the Tony-nominated original companies of The Addams Family, Sister Act and more has led to her having originated five roles on Broadway since 2010. Today, returning to the state where she cultivated her artistry, Watters is bringing home more than world-class talent: she is bringing a seasoned perspective on resilience and healing.
Watters attributes her longevity in the rigorous musical theatre industry to her toolkit she built while studying in the University of Northern Colorado’s (UNC) College of Performing and Visual Arts. It was within the rooms of Frasier Hall where she mastered the “basics” of script analysis, movement and characterization that she still carries into every professional contract today.
“My professors taught me to be curious and to know that I can not only use my imagination to create my characters, but I can actually use my own experiences to make characters come to life,” Watters said. “I certainly still use my UNC training.”
It was during her undergraduate years at UNC that she first encountered the challenges that would define her professional character. While many students measure their success by the roles they land, Watters discovered her professional footing through a lesson in resilience during her sophomore year. Following auditions for that year’s production of Side Show, Watters didn’t secure the role she had hoped for. Rather than letting the setback define her, she pivoted, securing a guest artist opportunity with a professional dance company in Colorado Springs.
“[UNC] prepared me to be able to process [challenges] with skill and ease, because I’d [faced those challenges] there. It’s an imperative skill to build resilience as a human, but particularly in the entertainment industry,” Watters said.
John Leonard, Professor of Musical Theatre, recalls Watters’ striking maturity and professionalism from age 18, which contributed to him immediately realizing that she would be an asset to the university’s Musical Theatre program.
“The main thing I remember is that I always arrived at rehearsals half an hour before actor call to set up the space and get organized, and every day Aléna had already arrived and was warming up and doing vocal and physical exercises,” Leonard said.
In 2021, Watters and fellow Musical Theatre alumnus Jason Veasey, ‘02, returned to campus to choreograph and direct (respectively) UNC’s production of Rent, an experience Watters described as both exciting and touching. Veasey, who has seen great success in The Lion King and the original Tony award-winning cast of A Strange Loop on Broadway, remains one of Watters’ closest collaborators today.
RELATED: Alumni-led Production of Rent Gives Current Students A Taste of Broadway
“These are definitely some close-knit people, Jason Veasey being one of them. He’s one of my best friends,” Waters commented. “We definitely have a community of networking, and the alumni just want to help each other.”
When Watters’ agent caught wind of auditions for the role of Diana in the DCPA’s Next to Normal, she was across the country performing in Come From Away at the Asolo Repertory Theater Company in Sarasota, Florida. So, in the middle of rehearsals, Watters had to complete a series of virtual callbacks with the creative team in Denver.
The DCPA describes Next to Normal as an exploration of how a family navigates their darkest hours — and finds the path to new beginnings. Propelled by an unforgettable pop-rock score, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and Tony Award-winning musical is an honest and unflinching ride through the complexities of mental health and unconditional love.
Additionally, the DCPA production of this gripping musical has more than one Bear connection, with DCPA Resident Stage Manager and current Adjunct Professor Corin Davidson of the School of Theatre Arts and Dance on the show’s stage management team. Davidson was even able to offer students in her Stage Management for the Theatre course the opportunity to observe technical rehearsals for Next to Normal, highlighting the real-world applications of their studies.
Getting to return to the very place where she grew up as an artist to perform this story has been a powerful experience for Watters, who recently expanded her career into being a trauma-informed coach and healing facilitator.
“My [mental health] training gave me a strength, firsthand knowledge and curiosity in my approach to analyzing characters,” she said. “Diving into this, I feel like I’m understanding deeper aspects of this character, and hopefully, these will allow me to translate a greater humanity to the audience.”
That humanity is drawn from a well of profound personal experience. When reflecting on how her own journey prepared her for the emotional weight of Diana, Watters points to a period of immense loss. During the pandemic, while living in New York City, she lost 18 friends, colleagues and family members in just 29 months, many without the closure of a funeral or ceremony.
“Grief can really mess with our brains, especially if we don’t have the outlets to fully express it,” Watters said. “Having experienced that, I can connect to that aspect of the character. I understand the depths of feeling and despair.”
Beyond her own grief, Watters draws on her childhood. Growing up with a father who was a Vietnam veteran struggling with bipolar disorder, she witnessed firsthand troubles that mirror Diana’s story. However, seeing her father’s journey to stability through mental health care gave her a unique lens through which to view the character’s struggle. Ultimately, it is this combination of professional expertise, personal loss and family history all seen through the anxiety of the modern world that informs Watters’ Diana.
As Watters prepares to take the stage at the Wolf Theatre in April, the UNC School of Theatre Arts and Dance community is rallying to support her, including Leonard.
“Aléna playing Diana is a phenomenal casting choice,” he commented. “Her resume reads like a book, and she is more than ready. [She] has the maturity and world knowledge to be the best Diana the world has ever seen.”
As for what’s next, Watters remains driven by a desire to share humanity through storytelling for as long as she is able. For her, the future involves a dual commitment to her craft as an artist and her mission as a healing facilitator. When she looks toward the horizon, her sights are set on a new kind of milestone.
“I think now my dream role is to have something created for me,” Watters said. “To have a role created that is an empowering woman who gets to do some kind of contemporary musical theater, R&B mix of singing, while also getting to dance and bring joy to others. That’s my dream.”
No matter what lies ahead, Watters continues to prove that the toolkit she built at UNC is capable of supporting a lifetime of transformation.
Get tickets here to see Watters take the stage in Next to Normal at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, running April 3– May 3, 2026 in the Wolf Theatre. Next to Normal is recommended for ages 14+ by the DCPA due to the following advisories: adult themes and language, drug use, mental health and self-harm.
Bears on Broadway
For decades, Watters has been one of UNC’s closest friends in the industry. In fact, following her run in Sister Act, Watters returned to teach a choreography workshop to musical theatre students. One student in the workshop, Aisha Jackson, would go on to become yet another successful Broadway alumnus, most recently seen as Daisy in The Great Gatsby.
“It’s been so exciting to see [Jackson] flourish and thrive, and on my birthday this past year, she got me a ticket to go see her star in The Great Gatsby (which was in the theater where I did Sister Act on Broadway), flowers and a note,” Watters said. “To get there and to see this woman who is so talented, who took my workshop, was just so beautiful.”
More bears on Broadway include:
- Joshua Buscher: Kinky Boots, Big Fish, Priscilla: Queen of the Desert, West Side Story
- Mehry Eslaminia: 1776
- Jenny Fellner: Pal Joey, Mamma Mia!, Wicked
- Victoria Matlock Fowler: Million Dollar Quartet
- Autumn Hurlbert: Tammy Faye, Legally Blonde
- Ryan Jesse: Jersey Boys
- Andy Kelso: Kinky Boots, Mamma Mia!
- Beth Malone: Angels in America, Fun Home, Ring of Fire
- Andrea Dora Smith: Motown, Tarzan
- Erica Sweany: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Honeymoon in Vegas, M. Butterfly
- Oscar Whiteney Jr.: Hell’s Kitchen
- Aaron Young: Fiddler on the Roof
