In between filming seasons 2 and 3 of Glee, the cast took their songs on the road — and there was plenty that fans missed behind the scenes.
“Clothing was always optional but at the end of it we were a little drunk and Zach [Woodlee, our choreographer] had finally gotten there and Darren [Criss] had been jamming with the Warblers and he finally got there,” Ashley Fink, who portrayed Lauren Zizes on Glee, recalled of touring during the Thursday, July 27, episode of the “And That’s What You Really Missed” podcast. “And we’re all like, ‘Let’s play spin-the-bottle because we’re not grown-ups.’”
Fink, 36, noted that they “all” played the makeout game — and “everyone ended up kissing everyone.” However, they did not know at the time that star Cory Monteith was “Patient Zero” and had been ill.
“He had a cold and so we all flew across the country with a sinus infection!” Fink said. “And had to land [in England] and get, like, B-12 shots and antibiotics because we were sick as s—t because our dumb asses all made out with each other before we had to fly across the country.”
While podcast cohost Jenna Ushkowitz completely forgot about their collective illness, Kevin McHale was unaware of the origin.
“I did not know that was how the contagion started,” McHale, 35, confessed. “[That game] was on my birthday. My gift to you all!”
While McHale — who played Artie Abrams on Glee — refused to name which costar that Monteith locked lips with during the party, he further detailed the memorable moment. “I just remember watching his face and it was so sweet and I remember thinking, ‘I need to lock this in. This is hilarious and wonderful,” he quipped.
Monteith died in July 2013 after an accidental overdose. He was 31.
Glee debuted on Fox in May 2009, following a rag-tag crop of high school students as they joined the supremely unpopular glee club. Ushkowitz, 37, McHale, Fink, Monteith starred in the comedy alongside Lea Michele, Amber Riley, Chris Colfer, Mark Salling, Naya Rivera, Dianna Agron and Matthew Morrison. Amid their Glee success, most of the cast found sweet friendships offscreen — that often resulted in lip-locks. (Michele, 36, and Monteith even found love and dated until his unexpected death.)
“We played spin-the-bottle so often. It was insane,” McHale reminisced on Thursday, clarifying it was always a “gender-blind” version. “I think we [even] played it that night of the Super Bowl commercial. It’s a gateway drug, it’s a fad!”
Fink, for her part, chimed in that the cast as a whole did not have “boundaries,” so their spin-the-bottle fixation made sense. “Who else are we going to make out [with]? We literally lived there,” she joked.
