Another San Diego Comic-Con has come and gone, but not without the Her Universe Fashion Show embracing glitz, glam, and geek couture for the eleventh year. Her Universe founder Ashley Eckstein and co-host Michael James Scott embraced all things Universal and Wicked for the event this time. Eckstein's was of course a familiar name in the SDCC sphere even before the fashion show thanks to her role as the voice of Star Wars' Ahsoka Tano, but it turns out that even being part of as formidable franchise as Star Wars didn't mean overcoming all of her fears about performing.
She and her co-host spoke with CinemaBlend about going full Wicked for SDCC this year, including why she pushed herself to play the Glinda to her Broadway best friend's Elphaba. I was fortunate enough to attend the Her Universe Fashion Show for the first time this year after Eckstein had opened up about leaning into Wicked and defying fashion. The Her Universe founder teased ahead of time that there "will be singing" with Michael James Scott on stage, but she joined him to kick off the fashion show with a medley of Wicked songs, including "Defying Gravity."
For Eckstein, the performance marked the first time she sang in public in 25 years, and it was in front of one of the stars of Wicked no less, with Nessarose actress Marissa Bode in attendance as a fashion show judge. She explained why she ended up singing:
It was really important to Universal. They said from day one, Wicked is a celebration of friendship, and it was important to have parity between Glinda and Elphaba, because that's what their friendship is all about, and it's about the two of them. So it was important to Universal, but it was also important to Michael and his husband Jeremy, that I sing. There was a meeting where, literally, everyone was on the call, and Universal said, 'Well, Ashley needs to sing too.'
Ashley Eckstein overcame nerves to host the Her Universe Fashion Show in the first place as well as tackle projects like her Star Wars Mindful Matters shorts, but singing Wicked was unlike anything she'd faced as a performer in public before. She went on:
And I was speechless then, like I am now! All eyes turned on me, and they're like, 'So you're gonna sing, right, Ashley?' And I was like, 'Uh, okay?' as I'm texting Jeremy behind the scenes. Like, 'You've got to be kidding me! No, no, no, I can't do this.' But the whole theme is, as I talked about during the show, not only defying fashion but defying your own expectations and your own fears and your own limits. And so I'm glad I did it. I'm glad they forced me to do it. [laughs]
Michael James Scott came to the Her Universe Fashion Show not only as Ashley Eckstein's longtime friend, but with a long list of Broadway credits including Aladdin, The Book of Mormon, and – one of my personal favorite musicals – Something Rotten.
He explained that he "grew up knowing and actually hearing Ashley sing" since they went to high school together, but Wicked does have "really, truly, some of the hardest music in the world." Eckstein elaborated on his point of being "excited about being alive and singing and being an artist," saying:
As kids, you naturally, I think, start out fearless. You're more willing to try things and so in my mind, I'm like, 'Oh my gosh, I'm in front of 2500 people,' and Michael has gone on to become one of Broadway's brightest stars. But what I tried to just remind myself of, and I feel like I did – going up on that stage, it was just us in high school. I just almost took myself back and said, 'This is no different than us in high school singing.' And so I did allow myself to have fun in that moment.
From my place in the audience of the fashion show, I never would have guessed that she hadn't sung publicly in decades, and Michael James Scott confirmed "that is the reaction from literally, basically everyone," and reiterated to his friend that she "can sing" and is a singer now. Ashley Eckstein went on to share why she decided to move past her nerves and perform with him:
Well, it was important for me to say something in that moment, because that was a really big deal for me personally. I've learned through doing my Mental Health Monday posts, and now we're doing Hype Friend [podcast], that I think people look at us on stage and think like, 'Oh, they don't get nervous. They have it all together.' No, we don't. We have the same fears, we have the same nerves, we have the same feelings and emotions that everyone else does on any given day, just like anyone. Some days you feel like you sparkle and you can take on the world, and some days you don't. And so I just tried to be real and I thought in that moment, I'm like, 'You know what? I'm gonna let this entire audience in on the secret of this real fear that I just overcame,' and hopefully, by sharing the story, I could help someone else out.
Ashley Eckstein and Michael James Scott were quite literally sparkling in pink and green outfits worthy of Wicked when we spoke at San Diego Comic-Con. This was Her Universe's biggest year yet with the fashion show, and the timing couldn't have been better for the Wicked theme. After the first movie won over audiences last year, Wicked: For Good arrives in theaters on November 21 in the 2025 movie schedule. As for Her Universe, it remains to be seen what Eckstein will have in store for 2026.
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