NBC mistakenly identifies ‘Sesame Street’ star as Lea Salonga during Thanksgiving Day parade

Despite all the rain that pelted New York City attendees, the first major outage of the 2024 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade wasn’t due to an influx of water when NBC’s broadcast of the event mistakenly identified a child actress as Broadway legend Lea Salonga.

Shortly after, TV co-hosts Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb introduced Salonga’s mid-parade performance of “Sing” along with the cast Sesame Streetthe camera cut to the stars atop a giant float themed to the children’s TV show.

When the recordings were made Sesame Street cast member Olivia Perez, NBC showed a title card that said “Lea Salonga,” even though Salonga — a Tony-winning actress known for her roles on stage — was not in the shot.

Salonga, 53, was eventually shown singing at the front of the float, with the title card left to properly identify her.

Weekly entertainment has reached out to NBC representatives for comment.

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On stage, Salonga has played a varied list of characters throughout her career, including in productions of Miss Saigon, Les Misérables, Catsand Here lies love. She also provided the singing voice for the titular character in Disney’s beloved animated film Mulan.

This year’s parade flub comes a year after the broadcast endured a glitch during Cher’s televised performance of her new Christmas single “DJ Play a Christmas Song,” in which a Christmas-colored visual disturbance temporarily interrupted the show.