Darren Criss on Counting His Lucky Stars !

Darren Criss has a habit of counting his blessings. "I count my lucky stars every day," he says with a laugh. 

At 37, Darren Criss is a Broadway star and a regular at piano bars. "Keep the music going, you know?" he said with a grin. "I think the saying goes, 'Life is a cabaret!'"

When he's in Los Angeles, you'll find him at Tramp Stamp Granny's, a piano bar he co-owns with his wife, Mia. "It’s a pretty sweet Hollywood story," he shared. "She slings the drinks, and I sling the tunes."

One unspoken rule of piano bars? Play the hits. Criss certainly learned that early on. His first major hit came at the University of Michigan, where he starred as Harry Potter in an unauthorized student production that went viral on YouTube in 2009.

"This was a very interesting moment in time," Criss reflected on A Very Potter Musical. "That really did change my life. It was the beginning of the journey that led me to where I am now."

 Criss explained, "The show starts with a song that asks the central question: Why love? Why do we do it? We know that loving something means entering into a contract with an inevitable end—the loss of that thing. So why do we do it, knowing that’s the outcome?"

For Criss, this show came at just the right time. He and his wife, Mia, have a two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and earlier this year, they welcomed a baby son.

I asked, "Does this feel like the best year of your life?"

He chuckled and replied, "Well, it’s certainly a blessed one. I’ve had some extraordinary years, and I think this one has been especially exciting."

Of course, it's been a year of mixed emotions. In 2020, Criss lost his father, Bill, to a heart condition at the age of 78. Then, in 2022, his brother, Chuck, tragically died by suicide at 36.

Criss reflected, "I don’t necessarily focus on my personal experiences with those specific people I’ve lost, but I do think about the universal feeling of loss—the sadness, emptiness, and loneliness that comes with it. We all feel that. But what moves me in life, and especially in ['Maybe Happy Ending'], is not the darkness of loss itself, but the Herculean grace it takes to be resilient in the face of its inevitability."

And when Criss reflects on this, he can’t help but sing.

"I count my lucky stars every day," he laughed. "I’m running out of room—there are too many! And now I’m doing CBS Sunday Morning!"