It’ll take two actors to keep the Tina Turner musical turnin’ and burnin’ at Academy of Music

Tina Turner is tickled it takes two actors to play her.

“It makes me chuckle a little thinking how much touring I did through my life and there was just one of me,” Turner said in an interview.

Yet when Tina: The Tina Turner Musical, arrives at the Academy of Music on the Kimmel Cultural Campus on Tuesday, two actors — Naomi Rodgers (Frozen) and Zurin Villanueva (The Lion King) — will alternate portraying the 12-time Grammy-Award winner, a testament to Turner’s greatness.

“It’s a whirlwind of emotions as it goes through so much of my life — all in one night,” Turner said. “I understand why two actresses are taking this role across the U.S.”

Tina, based on the tumultuous early life and successful solo career of the Queen of Rock and Roll, opened in London in 2018. After its successful Broadway run, which ended in August, the North American tour started in September, with Rodgers and Villanueva evenly sharing the lead. Philadelphia is the sixth stop on a 30-city tour.

It’s rare for two actors to share a starring role in a major stage production, or as theater geeks call it, to be double cast. The practice is usually reserved for child actors because of labor laws. The most notable: the three teenagers — Trent Kowalik, Kiril Kulish, and David Alvarez — who won the 2009 best actor Tony for the Broadway production of Billy Elliot The Musical.

Whether we’re talking Academy Award nominee Angela Bassett’s incomparable portrayal of Turner in the 1993 film What’s Love Got to Do with It or Adrienne Warren’s Tony award-winning Broadway performance in the jukebox musical, there has been only one actor portraying Tina Turner at a time. Until now.

“The show demands so much of the actresses who are playing me,” Turner said. “Each one of them must go on her own personal journey to deliver this story. That requires a lot of heart and vulnerability.”

Tina explores the songstress’ upbringing and music career spanning from the early 1960s through the 2000s. It is replete with high-intensity dance numbers like “Shake a Tail Feather,” “A Fool in Love,” and “Proud Mary.”

“After doing Broadway and the European productions, the Tinas were like, ‘OK, that’s enough,’ after five or six shows” Villanueva said, about the high level of stamina and energy the production requires.

Playing Turner is also emotionally taxing. The musical doesn’t shy away from showing the domestic abuse Turner suffered at the hands of her husband and partner, Ike Turner (Garrett Turner), leading to a suicide attempt. It also re-creates the haunting scene of a bruised Turner running across a Texas highway to escape Ike. Channeling this intensity day in and day out is why Rodgers is more than happy to share the lead. “Playing Turner requires every inch of my talent and skill,” she said.

Turner has never seen What’s Love Got to Do with It — reliving that period of her life with such laser focus on the abuse is just too hard for her — but she’s been involved with the musical since its inception. Some of the play’s most touching scenes include Turner learning to chant in the Buddhist tradition, a key to her finding the strength she needed to leave Ike. Her love life is also expanded beyond her marriage to Ike Turner, where she finds love again with German movie executive Erwin Bach (Max Falls).

“They found the love,” Turner said about the people behind the Tina production. “I wished my mother and Ike would have been able to see the show. ... The musical brought up many of the painful memories again, but it also helped me accept the highs and the lows.”

Villanueva and Rodgers each performed Turner’s sultry 1966 track “River Deep — Mountain High” in auditions. (That’s a give-it-your-all song if there ever was one.) Each woman has her own Tina Turner-approved clothing, shoes, and wig wardrobes. They toss their shoulder-length pageboys with the same verve as Tina did.

“I’m the tall Tina,” Villanueva said with a giggle. Villanueva’s favorite look? The dress she wears during the scene where Turner performs her 1993 cover of The Trammp’s 1976 hit, “Disco Inferno.” “That fire dress is so sexy. It’s larger than life. It just looks like a flame.”

Rodgers chimes in with her own Tina Turner favorite. “There is a scene where we go and meet Roger [Davies], Tina’s manager, for the first time and she’s wearing a very hip, orange, green, and yellow dress with a collar,” Rodgers says, describing the psychedelic wrap dress. “It’s so old-timey, but it’s fabulous. I mean, it’s a look.”

The hardest part of nailing the Tina Turner vibe? Perfecting her husky voice, hand movements, and gestures. If Rodgers or Villanueva ever met Turner, they would shower her with gratitude.

“I would thank her for not quitting,” Villanueva said. “Her story reminds us that nothing is over until we say it’s over and that we can’t let our circumstances stop us.”

And if Turner ever meets Rodgers and Villaneuva, says she’d do the same.

“Naomi and Zurin are joining a very unique group of women who step into my shoes,” Turner said. “That’s very special to me.”

“Tina: The Tina Turner Musical” runs from Nov. 22 to Dec. 4 at the Kimmel Cultural Campus’ Academy of Music. Tickets range from $113 to $268 and are available online on the Kimmel Cultural Campus’ website.