Kelly Clarkson’s Fresh Start: Finally, I Can Smile and Really Mean It

“Is there an audition going on?” a woman asks in the lobby of 30 Rock, the iconic New York City building where shows like Today, The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, and Saturday Night Live film. It’s not an outrageous assumption. A line of nearly 200 men and women, most in crisp black suits with blindingly white shirts, is snaking down the hallway to the Grand Staircase. They are doormen and women, taking a break from their posts in city buildings to make up the audience for the Season 5 premiere for the newest series to set up residence at the address: The Kelly Clarkson Show.

After four seasons filmed in Los Angeles, the production moved to New York this year at Clarkson’s behest, following a tumultuous divorce and a desire to leave California—and that chapter of her life—behind. It was her idea to populate the premiere audience with doormen and women, after being touched by her warm interactions with so many of them when she arrived in the city. There was no casting call; Clarkson wanted actual people who work that job and who become like family to buildings’ residents. The production team literally went, well, door to door, asking workers to come to the show. “The city is littered with unsigned packages!” Seth Meyers, the season’s first guest, joked.

Meyers was part of a roster of familiar faces who work in the building and stopped by the premiere, which airs Oct. 16. Today’s Hoda Kotb and Jenna Bush Hager were also guests, bringing chips and homemade queso with them. Name That Tune host Jane Krakowksi presided over a door-themed trivia showdown where Kotb and Bush Hager competed against Meyers and Clarkson in a game called—wait for it—“Hoda the Door.” (The game podiums were made by Parks and Recreation star Nick Offerman, and shipped to New York from Los Angeles.) Andy Cohen, one of TV’s most reliable hype men, introduced Clarkson’s entrance, giddily jumping up and down as she entered through a—yes, obviously—door and a line of applauding door men and women, singing.

Read more at The Daily Beast.