Kate Rockwell now knows what it’s like to work with the one person she’s most admired throughout her career. That person is Tina Fey, whose teen comedy “Mean Girls” became a hit in 2004 and was recently adapted for the Broadway stage. Rockwell portrays one of show’s lead characters, Karen Smith. But Rockwell isn’t new to Broadway — she has appeared in productions of “Rock of Ages,” “Hair,” “Legally Blonde,” and “Carousel.” She was also part of “Bring It On’s” original cast.

We sat down with Rockwell to chat about her role in the Tony-nominated musical, what it’s like as a feminist adult playing a submissive teenage girl, and collaborating with Fey.

“Mean Girls” is now playing at the August Wilson Theatre. For tickets and more information, visit the show’s website.

W&H: Do you remember seeing “Mean Girls” for the first time and what did it mean to you?

KR: I don’t remember the first time I saw it, but I had seen it just before I started working on the show. I had seen it enough times that I ran through the entire script and have almost the whole film memorized. It became very important to me very quickly.

I was in college when the movie came out, a little older than the rest of my castmates, so I think I absorbed it differently. I was more capable of experiencing the comedy of it rather than feeling like I was still living in those types of moments and those types of relationships. It also gave me a different perspective on the film. I was just so close to it and still appreciated Tina’s ability to really tap into what that really felt like and those real relationships.

W&H: What’s it like working with Tina Fey?

KR: Working with Tina, being in a room with her, and developing this show with her — which is a very particular type of comedy because this was her first screenplay and it’s something that’s very near and dear to her heart — is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Tina has always been one of my idols, both as a comedienne and also as a woman in the business. It took me a long time to feel normal around her because I just idolized her in such a way, and I don’t really feel that I have a lot of people I look up to the way I do to her.

She was nothing less than magnanimous, and I think cooperative, which is a weird way to describe someone at the top of the pyramid. All she ever wanted was to work together and give us material that allowed us to make the roles our own, and not allow us to feel like we had to recreate what was done on the film, which I can’t believe is 14 years old. Tina was so collaborative and open to our experiences in 2018 and also to our own experiences on stage. It’s different telling a story in this medium than it is on film, and Tina is a queen of comedy. So, this was new to her, and she wanted a hand in making it all work in this form [the actors] had all already worked in a little bit longer.

Rockwell (on right) and her castmates in “Mean Girls” on Broadway: Joan Marcus

W&H: Your character, Karen, is really funny and you have such comedic flare. Who else inspired you in the preparation of this role?

KR: This is more visual but if you ever go to a public space and watch young, young girl teenagers trying to put on airs of being older and how they walk and how they dress and what they think is to be a mature woman. It has changed a little bit, so perhaps my inspiration is a little bit dated, but I love the idea of what we’re supposed to do, how we’re supposed to dress, and what happens when our bodies can’t really do that yet because we don’t have the musculature, we don’t have the courage. It was really just an observation of watching girls watch each other and watching them watch themselves.

Unfortunately, Karen wasn’t dealt a full deck. It takes her a little bit, too, it doesn’t quite work. She’s not quite as capable as other girls. It sneaks through the cracks a little bit. I think it’s her innocence but a little bit more than [the characters] Regina, or even Gretchen. I like to call her particularly focused. She’s really good at focusing on the things she has been focused on, and unfortunately, sometimes that thing is not most important, like the cuticles or her nails, or the dead ends in her hair, but she’s very good at focusing.

W&H: What’s it like being in this show at the height of the #MeToo movement?

KR: It has a lot of resonance for us because we are keenly aware of the audience the show has, from the movie first, and how we have to bring that same audience to the Broadway community. We have a lot of young female fans, and we get to use the show as a platform to communicate with them and hopefully help focus and strengthen them during a time that the world that won’t do that for them. Certainly, some of our leadership won’t do that for them.

We are all aware, all of us, and are very conscious of that platform and very much interested in getting to those girls who are 13, 14, 15. We’re saying, “Come talk to us, come take home a message from this show which is all about being yourself, change, and who they tell you you are supposed to be.”

I will also tell you that I have a little bit of a two-sided nature to this because I’m playing a character who is not uncomfortable being what men think she should be, and that’s a really interesting thing for me as an actress to deal with. Maybe there are people who would disagree with me on this, but I also think there’s a thing about being comfortable in your body, being comfortable with sexuality, and the balance of maintaining all of that while not allowing someone else to dictate when it should be, what it should be. That’s something I think a lot about.

W&H: It sounds like you have the ultimate platform to educate young girls about these topics.

KR: Yes, I think it’s really hard. The wake of #MeToo has a lot of ripples in it. I have history playing women who are hypersexualized, whether they want to be or not. I’m a very strong, independent woman, so that’s always been something that interests me, how I end up playing in these roles. I think it’s important to make sure that we, as women, are allowed to make fun of our sexuality and that we don’t feel that just because we are starting to identify that there is a real predatory anger, especially in the entertainment industry, that we exist and we conquer, and that our sexuality is something that we are still allowed to maintain and cherish and respect. We can’t diminish it in the wake of the process of trying to build inner strength.