They combine showmanship, baking, and Broadway into delectable treats.

Jared Sullivan and Stephen Lowry of SHOWBOY BakeShop are our guests this week on Nevada Week In Person.

♪♪ Support for Nevada Week In Person is provided by Senator William H. Hernstadt.

-Welcome to Nevada Week In Person.

I'm Amber Renee Dixon, joining you from SHOWBOY BakeShop in Henderson.

It's here where you can find numerous references to Broadway in cupcakes like All That Razz and Red Carpet.

These are just a couple of the many creations that are the works of art of Jared Sullivan and Stephen Lowry, owners of SHOWBOY BakeShop.

Thank you for joining Nevada Week In Person.

(Stephen Lowry) Happy to be here.

Thank you for coming.

-Well, thank you for having us.

And so a lot of our viewers, many of our viewers probably know you from either Cupcake Wars or even the show Sister Wives.

I've heard you mention that.

(Jared Sullivan) So many people come in and know us from Sister Wives, more than the Food Network.

It's crazy.

-And because you made cakes for them.

-We did make cakes for them.

Absolutely lovely family.

-We randomly met them at a show on the Strip.

Janelle followed us on Instagram.

We just became fast friends.

-So she would always order for-- I think we did a wedding.

We did a couple of birthdays.

-A reunion.

-Yeah.

-And do they have very specific requests?

Because you can both do, I mean, pretty much anything.

-We'll do anything.

-Anything.

Janelle would give us a theme and say, This is what the plan is, but just do your thing.

-But for our viewers who do not know you both, let's start with the passion for Broadway.

Where did that start for each of you?

I'll start with you, Stephen.

-Well, originally, I just fell in love with the theater, and so I went to theater school and, you know, wanting to do that myself in England.

Yeah, so I was training in London, and I would always go to the musicals.

I always make him laugh when I say, I'd make my mom take me to Starlight Express, and we pay £5 and stand at the back every Saturday.

So that's really where it started.

And then once I started performing myself here in Vegas, I just also kind of got the baking bug.

And once I started doing it, I was like, why not just combine everything I love together then and do that full time?

That's kind of how that came about for me.

-Was Mom who got you into theater?

-No, actually.

I think just being a kid that was so enthusiastic about performing, it was like then I need to go see shows and see what people are doing.

It was kind of like a self-motivation, I suppose.

-It came to you?

-Yeah.

-Okay.

And then what about you?

-I grew up as a orchestra kid here.

-In Vegas?

-In Vegas, yeah.

My family's been here since 1954, so it's pretty crazy.

But yeah, I grew up in school doing the orchestra, and it just really gave me a love for music and theater.

And one of my very first jobs was selling show tickets at the Forum Shops at the concierge desk.

And from there, I got all these great connections with people at "Chicago The Musical."

And I started working there, and then I worked at "O" for Cirque du Soleil, and just kept building and building until I started working for a production company here, and that's where I met Stephen.

-And that's where you both met.

And I believe you were his boss at the time.

-Yes.

-What was the role?

-There was no drama whatsoever.

-Yeah, it was all good.

-Very encouraging.

-I mean, you have to meet people at work.

They say, Don't date at work, but where are you going to meet people?

-Exactly.

-And especially in Vegas, a lot of people have two and three jobs.

So I was working at the Rio in the daytime, and then I was doing the "Folies Bergere" at night as a dancer.

And that just was kind of the Vegas lifestyle.

Everyone I knew was from work, so, you know.

-Do you have a favorite role you have played here or production?

-"Divas Las Vegas" was really fun, because we got to dance for all the different divas.

And the "Folies Bergere," of course, was really iconic.

-Okay.

And then did you get to see him in all of these, or-- -Oh, yeah, absolutely.

I went to "Divas" at least three times a week.

Yeah, it was so much fun.

Just for him, yeah, because Frank Marino would always, you know, say, Come whenever you want, you know?

So I did.

-And "Divas" is funny, because the show, even though it's the same formula pretty much all of the time, it's like a different show every night.

The queens are so good, and they change their costumes and change what they're doing based on what that particular celebrity is, you know, currently doing.

-Their current song.

-Yeah, we got to change it up sometimes, which was nice.

It was easy to see that many times, I suppose.

-Oh, yeah.

-But you weren't a queen?

-I wasn't, no.

-We tell people that he was Ellen.

-But I was not Ellen, okay?

[laughter] -One of our friends is so mean.

He says that he's Ellen and I'm Rosie.

-And here we are on a talk show.

-And who am I?

Oh, boy.

So then you fall in love.

How?

By talking about Broadway?

-We really found that we have so much in common and so many things that we were both very passionate about and love doing on our spare time, and it really just drew us together.

-There's one moment that I always remember before we got together.

A group of us were downtown at the bar Don't Tell Mama, which is like the Broadway singing, you know, and he said to me, I bet you don't know that reference.

And I was like, Are you kidding me?

-Don't Tell Mama.

-And from that moment on, I was like, Oh, we're gonna be friends.

-And you proved him wrong?

-I sure did.

-I still remember the very first time I ever saw you was dancing on top of a slot machine at the Rio.

-What a fun memory.

-And that's because you told me before this you were a bevertainer.

-I was a bevertainer, yes, which was a program at the Rio.

We would serve cocktails during the hour and then do a performance for everybody at least once an hour for an eight hour shift.

-Did you like that job?

-It was definitely interesting.

I think-- -I honestly think that I've met some of the best people in the city from that job.

I mean, it's not about the job, it's about the people that work there and the environment you create.

And oh, God.

-It was performance.

-There's nothing like performers.

There's just nothing like that.

-Okay.

Then how do you get into baking?

-Oh, so, while-- boredom, basically.

When I, when I was in the "Folies"-- actually, it was before the "Folies," because I wasn't bevertaining yet--and my show time, my call time would be 10 p.m.

I had nothing to do with it.

I'd go to the gym or would take a class, and then I just started watching Food Network and was like, these people making the cakes are-- they're not bakers.

They're like artists, and that really made me want to try it out.

So I would, and whatever I made, I'm like, Who's gonna eat this?

I'd bring it to the green room, and everybody would eat it.

Then people started ordering from me.

They're like, Remember that thing you brought for this party?

Can I order it for my party?

And it snowballed from there, which was really cool.

-Okay.

And then how did you get involved?

-I made him.

-He got so busy.

Yeah, you got so busy with orders that he needed help.

And he's like, Oh, I have this cake, and they want characters and stuff.

And I'm like, I could probably do it.

I'm an artsy person.

I grew up doing, like, painting and doing stuff.

-I went to "Divas" that night, came home, and he had made a full set of Madagascar fondant characters.

And I was like, oh, my God.

You are absolutely hired.

-And that's when he fell in love with me.

[laughter] -Favorite all-time creation that you've made?

Do you have one that each of you, that you're like, that was so awesome?

-Mine is my Disneyland cake.

I love doing anything like charactery and fun and cartoony.

-How long does it take you?

-It took me about three weeks.

-Wow.

-It's been like a passion project for sure.

-Okay.

-I love to do, this is really random, I love to do any of the food-related cakes.

I love making cakes look like other foods.

So you know, like a sundae, ice cream sundae or-- -A bowl of spaghetti.

-Spaghetti.

The ramen noodles I love making.

-I've seen that.

-I don't know why.

I just think it's really fun to make something edible, something else edible, you know?

-Yeah.

What's been most challenging?

-Challenging.

-Weird, like, structurey cakes, like things that need to balance on top of something.

Or like if we do a show and they're like, Oh, it has to be at least 5 feet tall.

-Or spin.

-So you have to become like a carpenter on top of baking and artistry.

-Which you did, actually, on our last show.

We were on Cake Toppers, and they had a full tool shed.

And we, all the bakers, just looked at it like, What are we supposed to do with that?

Next thing I know, I can hear the drill going, the saw.

-I dropped an entire bucket of nails all over the floor.

[laughter] It was fun.

It was really cool.

-I stayed away from that part.

-You never went in there once.

-Big decision to leave the entertainment industry for your own business.

-Yes.

-Yeah, I feel we took a risk.

-We did take a risk, but we also kept our jobs.

When we first opened, I was still dancing for Frank in "Divas," and Jared was still managing the bevertainers.

And we gave it a good six months or so until we were like, Okay, I think this is gonna work.

We can do it.

I think, in part, that was because we had filmed Cupcake Wars.

And the success of that, actually, it brought us a lot of business.

So I think that gave us a safety net to know that we could step away from the entertainment industry, which is a really hard thing to do for performers, because a lot of performers don't know what else they would do, because it's their life.

-Yeah, it defines you.

-So if you can find something else you're passionate about and, you know, can do-- Don't get me wrong, look at us.

We're still showing off in one way or another.

[laughter] -You are still-- do you perform in here at all?

-We don't.

Our friend performed here.

We did a concert in here.

Our friend, Shoshana, and she performed in the corner, acoustic with a guitar.

It was packed in here, and we had some champagne, and we had a cupcake and everything, and it was a great night.

And it's quite a good space for it, actually, so we should get back into that.

-If nobody's in here, we definitely, because we play show tunes all day, that's all we play in here.

So we definitely, like, sing and dance.

We're here alone.

-An extra treat if you come in person, okay.

And now you are going to show me how you put together-- -Yes, we're going to show you how to do a fabulous SHOWBOY creation.

-Let's do it.

So I know both of you told me ahead of this your favorite creations.

I want to say my favorite is the Sesame Street cake.

-Thank you.

We love that one.

-We really appreciate the support of PBS, and you're also supporting Nevada Week In Person with these.

Show me how you put these together.

-So this is one of our favorite things to do.

It's theme to anybody's event.

So in this case, it is Nevada Week In Person, and we're going to have you actually decorate with us.

-Okay.

-So what we have is we've got some American buttercream icing.

-Do I grab it?

-You can grab it, yep.

And then we've even made some little themed sprinkles for you, a little custom blend.

-Your color scheme.

-And then we've got the logos as well, which we'll be using.

-So we have an edible printer.

So all the logos we do, we can do logos, pictures, all edible.

-An edible printer.

-Now, the thing about the frosting is a lot of people like to hold it with two hands, so I'll show you on this first, then I'll have you do it.

I'm going to hold your cupcake because they like to move once you put the icing on.

-Okay.

-So we're going to squeeze the frosting out, basically into like a bubble like that.

-Okay.

-Okay?

So I'll have you go now, and it takes a bit of a squeeze.

-There you go.

A little closer.

-A bit of a bubble.

-It's okay.

We'll still make it look amazing.

Don't you worry.

[laughter] -Put that one under the counter, and try again.

[laughter] -So mean, this one.

Okay, then we're going to take one of the PBS logos.

-Okay.

-There we go.

-Just smush it out.

-And you smoosh it on and give it a little press, because you want the frosting to come out from underneath it a little so we can get the sprinkles on there.

-See, that's perfect.

-Looks less like a turd.

-Yeah, right.

[laughter] It definitely doesn't taste like one.

And then the most fun part, we just take it and we just trim the edges like so.

Exactly.

Look at that.

-Oh, beautiful.

Thank you.

Oh, I love it.

-You can now work here.

You're an official showgirl.

-We'll see you tomorrow morning.

[laughter] -I was asking you off camera if someone were to step up their baking game and decorating game, what's the first thing they should buy?

-Definitely, things nowadays have come so far, and you can get a lot of good stuff in the grocery stores--Walmart, Michaels.

-Amazon.

-Amazon.

Yeah, invest in some tips.

Also, like the disposable baking bags or the reusable ones.

Having things like that on hand make you, I think, want to do more.

So it's always worth having.

-You'll want to practice.

-You're going to learn as a result.

And then I imagine you use many tips when you make these cookies.

-Our Leading Lady cookies, yes.

Actually, it's all handcrafted, and we like to kind of do our favorite leading ladies from Broadway musicals.

We've got Madeline Ashton, Jane Seymour, the six costumes I always love to make.

And we do it all with fondant, which is another icing technique, and then we hand paint it all and glitter it.

And honestly, they just kind of bring us joy.

-They're beautiful.

-Thank you.

-Anybody that we consider a leading lady, we always like to do a custom cookie for and do, like, a little gift for them.

So we've done one for you.

-We couldn't let you go without your very own Leading Lady.

-Oh!

Wow!

That's so beautiful!

-You are now immortalized as a Leading Lady.

-An official Leading Lady.

-Gosh, I was not expecting this.

Thank you so much.

-Of course, so very welcome.

-I wondered why you wanted to make sure we talked about them.

-Yes, that and the fact that I really love them so.

-Jared and Stephen, thank you so much.

-Thank you.

-SHOWBOY BakeShop in Henderson.

Come visit.

-Please.

♪♪