The memory of Nick Cordero will be alive and well when Broadway comes back this week.
The musical “Waitress,” which reopens Thursday night, will create a powerful tribute to the late star, who was part of its original cast and died July 2020 after contracting the coronavirus.
The show will feature on its menu board an item called “Live Your Life” pie, a reference to Cordero’s song “Live Your Life.”
“This week, we honored the memory of our beloved cast member Nick Cordero,” the official Instagram account of “Waitress” captioned a picture of the menu last week that features “a big ol’ slice.”
“His wife, @AmandaKloots, visited the diner as we unveiled the sign featuring ‘Live Your Life Pie.’ This special pie name, and moment in the show, will be a permanent part of every Waitress production in the world.”
Cordero, who originated the role of Earl in the Broadway production of the Tony-nominated show, died last year from complications due to COVID-19.
His widow, Amanda Kloots, was touched by the way the Broadway production is honoring her late husband.
“BROADWAY IS BACK with a ‘big ol slice of Live Your Life pie!!!’” she captioned a picture of the menu board on her Instagram page Wednesday.
“Heading to NYC for a very special opening night that will honor Nick!! Thank you to the whole @waitressmusical cast and crew for this special invite and tribute to the original Earl. I’m pretty confident that I will cry through the entire show but I can’t wait to be there.”
“Waitress” is one of several Broadway shows reopening after shutting down due to the coronavirus in March 20202. Kloots is excited for the show to return to live performances.
“Off to NYC!!!!” she wrote on a photo of herself on her Instagram story Wednesday. “Broadway is back and Im going to celebrate and honor my hubby in @Waitressmusical.”
Kloots has been vocal about how she has attempted to cope after Cordero’s death.
“What happened was unthinkable, losing you was my biggest fear,” she wrote in July on Instagram on the one-year anniversary of his death. “I used to tell you all the time, ‘Don’t you dare go anywhere. If I lost you, I don’t know what I’d do.’ There hasn’t been a day this year where you weren’t missed, thought about and talked about. Thank you for being our guardian angel, for sending me signs, for being my DJ in heaven.”
Despite losing her husband, Kloots, who shared this summer that she has started to date again, has said she needs to march on.
“My overall theme for grief is that I know Nick would want me to move forward,” she told TODAY with Hoda & Jenna in June.
“I know he would want me to find joy. I know he would want me to be the strongest woman and mother I could possibly be. So, I always keep that in the back of my head.”
