Lifelong Shorewood resident, senior Meera Antigua has been dancing, acting, and singing through life while in the midst of travels to New York and throughout her unique college application experience.
“I intend on going [to college] for musical theater and potentially a double major in pharmaceutical sciences as well,” said Antigua.
In the second step of the application process for her musical theater degree, Antigua submitted multiple prescreens: video-based auditions applicants submit to colleges, performing dance numbers, monologues, or songs from plays or musicals.
“If [the admissions officers] want to see more, they pass you and you’ll get an invitation to go audition in-person,” Antigua said. “I’ve passed three so far: Ithaca, Temple, and Syracuse.”
Antigua’s interest in musical theater has not been a recent development–she has been passionate about the art form since she was young, but didn’t consider pursuing it as a career until recently.
“Since third grade, I’ve been performing,” Antigua said. “I never really saw it for myself until this past year. I started auditioning for camps and intensives over the summer, and when I started getting in, I realized that maybe I can do this for real.”
Over the summer, Antigua attended two intensive camps in New York City, where she filmed her prescreens. The first one she attended was OpenJar Institution, which she submitted multiple rounds of auditions for.
“It was a very small group of students, around 60 in my session, from around the States, Australia and Canada,” Antigua said.
Along with the other students at the institute, Antigua had the opportunity to work for around nine hours every day with various people in the Broadway industry.
“This included dance classes from Nick Alvino and Brian Martin, voice lessons from Stacia Fernandez and Matthew Lee Robinson, and acting classes with Lily Kaufmann and Jake Swain,” Antigua said.
The week concluded with audition practice for the students in front of a panel of professionals with extensive Broadway experience.
“We ended the week-long session with mock auditions in front of Jeff Whiting, a Broadway casting director, and Judine Somerville, seen in Hairspray,” Antigua said. “This was a life changing experience for me and helped me realize this is what I want to do in my future.”
The second session Antigua took part in was through the Broadway Artists Alliance. This one was even more selective, with only 25 kids in her age division of 16-21.
“We were in classes from 8–5 for dance, acting, and voice,” Antigua said. “This week had more personalized training with very big names in the industry including Randy Graff (OBC Les Mis as Fantine), Desi Oakley (Broadway: Wicked as Elphaba, Waitress as Jenna, Chicago as Roxie), and Bob Cline (Bob Cline Casting).”
During this intensive, Antigua was able to continue filming her pre-screens and other audition tapes.
“This made me super prepared for the college process and taught me how to work in front of a camera,” Antigua said.
Stemming from this experience, Antigua was invited by Broadway Artist Alliance to perform in New York in October.
“There were 16 performers total, and I got to sing two songs in a real NYC Cabaret, which is a huge accomplishment for me,” Antigua said.
Aside from the numerous classes related to musical theater, Antigua’s overall experience in New York was transformational.
“These experiences shaped me so much as a performer and showed me what it would be like to be working on Broadway,” Antigua said. “I developed so much over the two weeks and made me even more passionate about theatre.”
While grateful for the experience she’s been given at SHS, Antigua is preparing to move to bigger stages in the future, both in the theatrical sense and in other areas of life. She hopes to be a part of a national tour post-college.
“I’m excited [to be] able to perform in so many new cities and new places,” Antigua said. “I’m applying to a lot of schools on the east coast, so I’ll be around a lot of good regional theater, and a lot of opportunities.”
Antigua encourages everyone to pursue a path they are interested in.
“I’m a big believer in following your dreams, and I know musical theater seems so out of reach with Broadway and whatnot, but if you never try you’ll never succeed,” Antigua said. “Anyone out there who wants to follow their dreams, they should.”