With a 10-year-old daughter, I am used to the giggles of little girls. She can create a little of her own, and with a friend over, those chuckles fill the house. So, it didn’t really phase me that there was a growing giggle concert
behind me in the Barnes & Noble Starbucks on Fifth Avenue, until the mom leaned in an asked my interviewee if her girls could have his autograph.

Yes, the days of anonymity are over for University of Kentucky graduate Derek Keeling, who was the one many viewer’s wanted to play Danny Zuko on NBC’s recent Grease reality show. It’s not that Derek gets mobbed, but he gets approached a lot. A few fans even delayed our meeting for a few moments.

The show in question was Grease: You’re the One That I Want, in which viewers voted to decide which contenders would land the roles of Danny and Sandy in the upcoming Grease revival. Derek, of course, did not get the role of Danny. That went to Max Crumm, thanks to a legion of Slacker Backers. Derek was quite candid about the show and his odyssey from presumptive winner to last Danny cut before the finals. We’ll share more of that conversation in a feature story in a few weeks here.

But no doubt, being on a national TV show, was very, very good for the Wildcat’s career. Companies that are booking him offer to put his name above the show’s title. He was courted by a number of agents. And he’s getting opportunities that used to go to "name" actors.

Derek is also another illustration of the tightly woven web of Kentucky and Kentucky connected talent in New York. To reach him, we put a call in to Joan Rue at the  University of Kentucky Theater Department, who put us in touch with Louisvillian and UK graduate Chase Jennings, who is an agent up here, who knew Derek and put us in touch with him. And then, when we were chatting with Derek, he knew or worked virtually every Kentuckian on Broadway we mentioned.

But not many of them get a reaction from little girls that Derek gets.