Her performance as the fictional aging Hollywood starlet won Scherzinger her first Tony Award this year. In her acceptance speech, she said she’s always second guessed herself.<\/p>\n
“Growing up, I always felt like I didn\u2019t belong. But you all have made me feel like I belong, and I have come home, at last,” she said in tears to a roaring crowd.<\/p>\n
While talking about that moment to Willie, Scherzinger explained that she’s felt overlooked her “whole life.”<\/p>\n
“I want to say something really fast I\u2019ve never said before,” she told Willie. “Like you said, people have been s—-ing on me my whole life and just kind of dismissing me and discarding me or overlooking me. And it didn\u2019t matter, because I knew what I had to give was so much greater and even beyond me.”<\/p>\n
“If you just follow your heart\u2019s whisper and your passions, then it doesn\u2019t matter,” she continued. “You\u2019re gonna be able to live in your purpose and be your happiest and your most fulfilled and live a really meaningful life. … As long as you believe it, and it comes from the right place, and it comes from a place of truth and heart and soul and honesty, then you\u2019re gonna blow \u2018em all away.”<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/nicole-scherzinger-me-250726-b671c1.jpg\")
Nicole Scherzinger accepts the Tony for best performance by an actress in a musical on June 8, 2025.Theo Wargo \/ Getty Images for Tony Awards Pro<\/p>\n
Scherzinger says she knew she had a deep appreciation for music ever since she heard Whitney Houston sing for the first time.<\/p>\n
“When I was 6, I discovered Whitney Houston, and that changed my life,” she said. “I was very shy. I was the first girl to always want to hide behind my mom\u2019s legs, but music did something else to me. It just brought something else out in me, and I felt that was a way I knew how to communicate best with people.”<\/p>\n
Around her college years, Scherzinger toured with the rock band Days Of the New. Then, in 2001, her mother encouraged her to audition for the reality TV show, “Popstars.” <\/p>\n
After blowing away the judges with her voice, Scherzinger won a place in the short-lived girl group Eden’s Crush before she became the lead singer of The Pussycat Dolls.<\/p>\n
“It was a whirlwind,” she said of her time being in the famous girl group. “I think Eminem was at his height at that time. They were like, ‘You\u2019re schedule\u2019s even crazier than Eminem\u2019s schedule.'”<\/p>\n
But the demands of the group were intense, she says.<\/p>\n
“Now we have, like, mental health and awareness. We never had any of that then, so they kind of just worked us to death,” she explained. “So it was just natural that we fizzled out and everybody went their separate ways.”<\/p>\n
![\"Celebrities](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/nicole-scherzinger-me-250725-83edd4.jpg\")
Nicole Scherzinger performs as Norma Desmond during the final show of Broadway “Sunset Boulevard” revival.Bruce Glikas \/ Bruce Glikas\/WireImage<\/p>\n