Ryan Steele in last year's film Five Dances.

He may be only 24 years old but Ryan Steele is not wasting any time in making a splash in more than one medium.

The Michigan native has taken on Broadway with roles in Newsies, Matilda, Billy Elliott: The Musical and West Side Story. You may have seen him as part of the dance ensemble on television in Smash. And last year, he made us all swoon more than a little bit in his first film playing a dancer in Alan Brown's Five Dances. 

Now, we'll be able to see him back on our televisions on December 4th when he appears as Curly in the NBC production of Peter Pan Live. While last year's live musical production of The Sound of Music brought harsh criticism for the acting chops (or lack thereof) for star Carrie Underwood, the broadcast also brought in huge ratings.

This year, NBC is bringing us Peter Pan with a cast including Allison Williams (who we've seen act and sing on Girls) in the title role and the always entertaining Christopher Walken as Captain Hook.  

TheBacklot talked to Steele recently about his various roles on stage and screen as well his role in Peter Pan and, on a more personal note, being public about his relationship with Broadway singer/actor Matt Doyle and, since they are no longer together, what his relationship status is right now.

The Backlot: I don’t know how much you can say about Peter Pan at this point but how did it come into your life?

Ryan Steele: I had heard that they were doing Peter Pan right after The Sound of Music aired last year and so it’s sort of been on my radar and I obviously love the show. I’ve loved the story since I was a little boy and this past spring I got to work with Rob Ashford doing an opera in Houston, so it was definitely something that I wanted to be a part of. I just went to auditions, and a few auditions later they offered me the role of Curly, one of the Lost Boys. So I get to spend a lot of time working with Allison Williams, who plays Peter, and Taylor Louderman, who plays Wendy. It’s a really wonderful cast, and the energy in the room is awesome.

Knowing the story so well, does that help you or do you have to put it out of your head and just follow the script and direction?

RS: I would say my knowledge was sort of irrelevant. The way that Rob is approaching this is a very blank-slate production. We’re starting from the ground up, recreating moments, and it’s very different than any other production that’s ever been. So we’re sort of all creating new characters and it’s been really fun.

From the original Newsies cast: Aaron Albano, Alex Wong, Steele & Empraim Sykes. 

Do you feel challenged differently than you have in the past in Broadway roles or any film roles?

RS: Yeah, it’s very similar, I guess it’s very similar to Newsies in that it has a young energy and there’s a lot of athletic dancing and we’re singing very high. The camaraderie on stage is very important with the Lost Boys and Peter. Luckily, it’s a really wonderful group. So, yeah, the challenge is very similar to Newsies.

But there could be differences just doing this for television and worrying about the cameras, right?

RS: I’m trying my best not to worry yet, but it’s definitely a unique situation. Where, in theater, you do a show eight times a week and if you mess something up one night, it’s unfortunate but you have another shot at it the next night. When you’re on film, you can cut and do the scene again. But with this, you get one shot, and there are 20-something million people watching, so it’s a little scarier. I’m trying not to worry about that yet. I’m sure I’ll be pretty nervous, but I’ll be super excited, too. Such a cool opportunity.

What’s your backstory with dance? When did it begin with you?

RS: I’m from a small town called Walled Lake, a suburb of Detroit, and I went to a local dance studio there and trained in everything. In my high school years, I started to really focus on ballet, and that’s what I wanted to pursue. So when I was a senior in high school I got a contract with a ballet company, but I was also traveling to audition [and] I was offered the role of Baby John in the Broadway revival of West Side Story. So I sort of had to decide between that and the ballet company contract. I decided to go with musical theatre, something that I’d never done before, but I fell in love and that’s what I’ve been doing since. Four Broadway shows and a bunch of random stuff here and there.

Do you have kind of a bucket list of shows that you want to be in sometime that you haven’t already?

RS: I mean, as a male dancer, off the top of my head, West Side Story comes to mind because it’s such a classic, and it’s so brilliant, and I checked that one off. Then, after that, if you had asked me this question, I would have said Newsies. I’d been obsessed with the movie since I was little, but I also checked that one off, so I’ve got to find another one to add to the bucket list. Peter Pan, I guess, but shoot, check that one off, too.

Maybe A Chorus Line will come back around.

RS: Oh, yeah, absolutely.

The wonderful and beautiful film, Five Dances, can now be seen on Netflix. 

How would you describe your coming-out process?

RS: I have the greatest family and very open-minded and supportive parents so it was pretty stinking easy, which I can’t believe I’m saying. But I mean, I had struggles elsewhere, but my parents were not part of that.

Your character, Chip, in Five Dances definitely had an overbearing mother, so you had the sense maybe it wasn’t as easy for him. How did that role come to you?

RS: I had a breakdown from my agent saying that there was a short film, I think it was called Seven Dances then. I went in not knowing anything and we were just supposed to prepare a monologue and a dance piece. They didn’t give us any material from the actual script. Then, our next call back that we had, I think we had a scene that was roughly based on what was going to be in the script. Basically, Alan Brown, the director, approached this project with minimal script.

So after he cast his dancers, he really spoke to us, and got to know us, and shaped the characters off of us. Not to say that Chip, like, is based off me. But me being from the Midwest, that may have been part of that or something like that. The script was constantly changing during the filming process and we were also very new to performing on camera. So we were all going into this process feeling a little bit out of our element. So we all had a tremendous amount of trust and openness, which, I think really helped.

The love scene with you and Reed is really beautiful. How did you guys prepare for that especially since you didn’t have a lot of film experience?

RS: I remember going to lunch one day and we were learning the dances and it was our first day working together, and we just sat down, and we said, ‘we already know that there’s going to be some sort of love scene, so we just put it all on the table.”

I don’t know if you're aware, Ryan, but you were pretty much naked in that love scene.

RS: [laughs] Sure was! I sure was! Alan called Reed [Luplau] and I and said, ‘this is what I’m thinking I would like to happen. Are you comfortable with it? Tell me your thoughts.’ And I had sort of done some research on Alan and I looked into his prior films and I knew that whatever he was planning on doing would be tasteful and artistic and beautiful and I knew it wouldn’t be some sort of raunchy sex for sex sake. I knew it would serve the purpose and it would be beautifully done, so I absolutely had so much trust in Alan, and I think Reed felt the same, which is why it worked out. I mean, I was still nervous and scared out of my mind, but it was a nice energy in the room.

Matt Doyle and Steele were featured in OUT earlier this year. 

In your personal life, you and Matt were very public about your relationship. I’m curious if, looking back, do you regret putting your relationship out there like that?

RS: No, I don’t regret it. It sort of was beyond our control when it started to become public, so we were sort of forced to embrace it. Our generation is so about social media and unfortunately it’s a necessity a part of our business. Not for your personal life, but for your professional life. So you are your business. It’s impossible to find something so important to you as a significant other so when people started to find out, we just had no choice but to embrace it. We could have gone out of our way to hide it, but that would have been silly so we didn’t do that.

And now?

RS: Single. I’m still too soon to try to commit to anything. I’m focusing on my career.

And your career often includes dancing with some beautiful men so that maybe is a good thing.

RS: Please! It’s New York City, the land of talented, beautiful men.

Where do you see yourself in the next five, 10 years? Do you see yourself doing stage work? Do you want to do more film?

RS: Oddly, the past five years have been about new experiences for me. Like I said, when I was in high school, I was all about a career in ballet, and then, suddenly, I was on Broadway, and when I got on Broadway, I was, ‘I want to do more shows, I want to do more shows,’ and then I did Five Dances. For me, it’s been a little dangerous to try to plan what I’m going to do because it never ends up that way so I’m just going to try to stay open and willing to learn about new things, because some of my highlights in my career so far have been new experiences.  My Broadway I didn’t know anything about theater, and with Five Dances, I didn’t know anything about film and fell in love with it. So I guess just keep an open mind and just working hard, you know.

Peter Pan Live airs December 4 on NBC. You can currently watch Five Dances on Netflix.