Melissa Benoist may be best known for her six seasons as leading lady of Supergirl at this point in her career, but her big break into TV came via Glee, where she played Marley Rose for two of that show’s final three seasons. Recently, the actress opened up about the pressure from Glee and how it prepared her to join the Arrowverse alongside Arrow‘s Stephen Amell, The Flash‘s Grant Gustin, and many others.
Supergirl was a wild ride for Melissa Benoist, as it involved not only her first lead role, but involved starting on CBS before moving to The CW, joining a superhero franchise already going strong, and meeting her future husband on set. As it turns out, the workload of Glee helped her gain confidence. Speaking on Collider’s Ladies Night, she said:
What I learned on Glee was that I was a really hard worker and that I could do really hard things, because the schedule on that show was grueling because there were so many moving parts. It was fun but tough. I’m sure if you’ve had anyone else from the show on here, they’ve said the same thing. You had to rehearse the dances, you had to prerecord the songs, then you had to film the songs, and filming the songs were a lot longer. They took hours and hours and hours. And then you also had the scene work. I knew that Supergirl was going to carry a lot of pressure, and the responsibilities were going to be immense, and I think that my experience on Glee gave me the belief that I had the ability to carry Supergirl.
Although the two shows were quite different, Marley on Glee helped Benoist to believe in what she was capable of to play Kara on Supergirl. That’s not to say that some of her Glee skills didn’t come in handy on Supergirl beyond being ready for the work ahead of her. A crossover with The Flash united her with fellow Glee alum Grant Gustin for a fun but bonkers musical episode, which actually made sense within the loose rules of the Arrowverse.
Supergirl was the second of the main Arrowverse shows to come to an end, with Kara’s final adventure airing in November 2021, just shy of two years after Arrow wrapped in early 2020. Benoist continues to speak about her superhero role, however, including her explanation for why she won’t give Milly Alcock advice as Alcock gears up to play the character on the big screen. (The Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow release date is set for June 2026.)
While starring on a network TV show for six seasons and more than 125 episodes – along with the series surviving the COVID-19 production complications – is a major accomplishment for Benoist, her post-Supergirl TV work hasn’t been quite as successful despite her hard work. She arrived on Max for subscribers as star and producer of The Girls on the Bus back in the early spring, but the show was cancelled after one season in May.
You can revisit Melissa Benoist’s time on Supergirl easily enough if you have a Netflix subscription. All six seasons are currently available streaming on the platform, along with the full runs of Arrow, The Flash, and Legends of Tomorrow if you want to revisit Arrowverse crossovers. (Batwoman streams on Max.) If Benoist’s comments put you in the mood for some Glee, that series is available with a Hulu subscription. For some more current and/or upcoming options, check out our 2024 TV schedule.