Ellen Greene revisits Audrey from 'Little Shop of Horrors' for the
film's 40th anniversary
[August 14, 2026]
By LINDSEY BAHR
Ellen Greene can still do a killer Audrey.
In conversation, she seamlessly slips in and out of that singular voice
— a little breathy, a little squeaky, a little lispy, a little New York
— that made her “Little Shop of Horrors” heroine an instant icon. It
wasn’t a register she’d planned on hitting at the audition. It just came
out of her in the moment, and it stuck.
“I didn’t think about it,” Greene, 75, said in a recent interview with
The Associated Press. “It was weird, I mean, I don’t know where half of
this stuff came from.”
Back on tour with ‘Little Shop’
In her long and robust career on the stage and screen, Audrey is perhaps
Greene’s defining role. Her tragicomic shopgirl of skid row belted her
way into audiences’ hearts off-Broadway in 1982, and then in Frank Oz’s
1986 film opposite Rick Moranis.
The catchy musical about that flesh-eating plant is never too far in the
rearview either. Every few years it seems she’s beckoned for an encore.
In 2015, she reprised the role for three sold-out shows, with Jake
Gyllenhaal playing Seymour.
Starting this weekend, she'll be making stops around the country for the
next few months for 40th anniversary screenings, from Seattle (Aug. 18)
to Atlanta (Nov. 13). Performances of “Somewhere That’s Green” have been
promised too.
'Somewhere That’s Green'
That aching ballad about wanting more, aside from being one of the big
showstoppers, holds a special place for Greene. She remembers first
listening to it on the unemployment line, waiting to get her check, and
quietly singing along.
“I just knew there was an Audrey inside of me waiting to be born,”
Greene said.
She carried that feeling to the audition where composer Alan Menken
jumped in to play the piano with lyricist Howard Ashman, already her
great friend, looking on. When she finished, everyone was in tears.
Getting the role wasn’t any sort of immediate windfall either. When they
started at the WPA Theatre in New York, she was being paid $50 a week
for a month of rehearsals and two months of shows off-Broadway. But it
was a hit. One night, Steve Martin, who would later play Audrey’s
abusive dentist boyfriend in the film, even came to see it with Mary
Tyler Moore.
On the stage, she performed “Somewhere That's Green” sitting on a trash
can. For the film, Ashman wrote the number to be staged like the Leslie
Caron and Cyd Charisse numbers they both loved, where a character walks
into a room and suddenly they’re in a different outfit for the song.
“You would think I would just have been floored and so excited that he
gave me this gift,” she said. “Instead, I call him up and I’m crying my
eyes out. And I’m saying, wait for this, ‘Where’s my trash can?’”
Ashman, she said, just laughed and assured her that they’d elicit the
same response when the camera pans out to reveal she’s still on skid
row. Ironically, this whole exchange happened before she’d even
officially been cast in the movie.
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Ellen Greene poses for a portrait on Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2026, in Los
Angeles. (Photo by Birdie Thompson/Invision/AP)
 How the audience saved Audrey
from dying
The story of how the film was made is long and bumpy. John Landis
was originally attached to direct, then, briefly, Martin Scorsese,
before it found its way to Oz. Greene’s participation was never a
given, either. Producer David Geffen wanted to get a “bigger name,”
like Cyndi Lauper, on screen.
“I never thought I would have gotten the film,” Greene said.
But it’s hard to imagine anyone else turning in a performance as
distinctive. Test audiences loved her Audrey so much that they
wholly rejected an ending in which she dies.
“I love that death scene, personally,” Greene said. “But I had an
inkling, you see, because Frank directed the Audrey for the screen
more heroine-like.”
He’d taken out lines from the play like “you don’t meet nice boys
when you live on skid row,” she said in Audrey-speak. She thinks it
set her up a little differently. Then at the end, there’s the line
“when I die, which should be very shortly.” On stage, she said it to
the audience. In the film, she says it to Seymour. It's more
intimate and serious.
“Frank thinks it’s because we didn’t take a bow, like in the play,
but I think it’s because it’s just the line is interpreted two
different ways. One sets it up that this is silly and I’m OK, and
the other one is it’s real and it’s touching,” she said.
Oz ultimately relented and they shot a happier conclusion. Now,
Greene just likes that they both exist (the original in a director’s
cut).
Keeping Howard Ashman's memory alive
Remembering “Little Shop” is also a way to remember Ashman, who died
of complications related to AIDS in 1991. Their friendship was one
of many laughs, songs and adventures. He even took her on her first
trip to Paris.
“We got into my room and he put on a bubble bath, because he knows I
love bubble baths. I got into the bath, he gave me Champagne, he
gave me caviar, he put on Piaf,” she said. “We had separate rooms,
of course, but we were close, so what can you do? And I’m from the
theater, so I’m not modest.”
He also looked out for her. When they were drawing up contracts for
the “Little Shop” stage run, all she could think about was making
sure London was in there. Unbeknownst to her, Ashman had also given
her a half point of the profit, “because I created Audrey,” she
said.
“That’s how generous and kind he was and how much he loved me,” she
said. “Everybody loves Audrey because we, I, loved her first. And
everybody loves “Little Shop” because we put so much love in it … I
am so grateful and very humble because when they love ‘Little Shop’,
they keep it alive, and they keep Howard Ashman alive.”
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