Senior Felix Martinez can often be found on the Prep stage, whether he’s playing the character of Kinickie in the musical “Grease” or Sky in “Guys and Dolls,” he captures the attention of the audience with his voice and acting. In college, Martinez is trying to pursue a Bachelor of Fine Arts in either musical theatre or acting but is leaning more toward the former because of its variety of options. Majoring in musical theatre is combining the three majors of acting, music, and dance into one overarching major.

In preparation for this long college audition process, Martinez has been taking dance lessons. These dance lessons are a combination of the major dance types of Jazz, Ballet, and Hip Hop. Additionally, he has been seeing an acting coach since last April. Once a week, for an hour, he participates in a small group where they hone their skills.

Martinez was astonished to see the level of improvement he had in just a couple of months. Through these lessons, Martinez discovered the fun and expressive side of acting, “I harness my own emotions and put it into my craft, whereas before, in sophomore and junior year, it was conjuring this character with some relations to who I am, but more as an image of what I think they should be,” said Martinez.

The college audition process itself is long and time-consuming. Before Martinez can even audition, he has to go through something known as a prescreen. A prescreen, simply put, is auditioning for an audition. During this, Martinez records himself singing songs, reciting monologues, and even dancing. His go-to monologue is “Living at Home” by Anthony Giardina and his two most used songs are “In Love With You” from “First Date” and “My Time of Day” from “Guys and Dolls.” On top of this, there is also an artistic application Martinez must go through in which there are more essays, which is entirely separate from the Common Application. So far, he doesn’t have a top school “I would like to meet the faculty first before considering which program would suit me best,” Martinez said.

Looking down the road, Martinez hopes to work shows professionally, whether that be on Broadway or regional theatres, and he’s well on his way with every application he sends in.

Sydney Beaty, known for her roles as Cinderella from “Into the Woods,” Sarah in “Guys and Dolls,” as well as an extraordinary soprano in Seattle Prep’s choir, has decided to continue to pursue her passion in fine arts at a college tailored to her aspirations.

Beaty applied to 25 schools located within the US ranging from Loyola Marymount University to Syracuse. She began her application process by submitting prescreens. These prescreens showcased her singing abilities and performance of monologues. She explained, “if they like what you submit, they will call you to do it in person.” The in-person audition can take place in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

When asked what her day would look like as a college student who is fully committed to her future as an artist, she responded that a typical day would consist of “singing class, acting class, dance choreography, and then rehearsals at the end of the day. Each class is pretty small…about ten girls and ten guys.” While this might seem daunting, she emphasized that it is an important part of the preparation for her future artistic endeavors.
Beaty credited much of her preparedness for this journey to Prep’s education. The art program and its teachers have played a crucial role in nurturing her talents and enabling her to develop into the aspiring artist she is today. She explained that because Prep has challenged her and forced her to balance school, arts, family, and friends she is confident and prepared for whatever college she finds best fits her.

Beaty will be traveling to Chicago and Los Angeles for live auditions in February. Break a leg, Sydney!

After four years in film club, three self-directed short films, and a lifelong passion for cinematography, senior James Endter has chosen to pursue a Fine Arts degree in directing.

Finding himself frequently landing the director position in film club, Endter noticed that the ability to take control of production and “create a unique vision for whatever type of project I was working on” was his favorite way to create films and a major that seemed like a “natural choice.” In order to solidify this decision to major in directing, last summer Endter produced three short films which featured other Prep talent, such as fellow seniors Felix Martinez and Matthew Wingo.

After finishing these films and finalizing his decision to pursue directing, Endter searched for the perfect program. He prioritized finding a school that included classes on the “fundamentals of other filmmaking skills like cinematography and editing”, along with a program that focused on hands-on student-led film production.

Location soon became a key factor for Endter’s search, finding that schools in film hotspots such as Chicago and Los Angeles best fit his standards, with some of his top prospects being Loyola Marymount University and DePaul. Within these schools he has found the hands-on outlook he was looking for along with a welcoming and collaborative environment, “Both schools make sure everyone has the funds to make films and have created an environment where someone could be a producer on someone’s film and someone else could be a cinematographer on theirs, it’s all very communal and supportive.”

Finally, after locking down his prospects, Endter began to compile a portfolio. This unique feature of applying for a fine arts major can entail a variety of mediums but Endter found that the majority asked for similar material stating, “For most of my schools I had to submit films of various lengths so over the summer I made three films: a five-minute, three-minute and a two-minute film”. For some of the more rigorous applications such as for UCLA, Endter also included his self-written scripts.

In college and beyond Endter looks forward to “putting my blood, sweat, and tears into everything he produces on stage”. Whether on the sunny sets of Los Angeles or the snowy stages of Chicago, Endter is sure to find success wherever he ends up.

Most Prep seniors’ college application processes consist of writing essays and taking SATs, but Molly O’Donnell was also learning languages, tackling singing lessons, and being the first Prep student to conduct the choir on top of the average application requirements.

O’Donnell plans to major in vocal performance with an emphasis in choral music in college, which adds many requirements to her college resume. “I apply to the universities like everyone else, but also, I submit a resume and travel to schools for auditions,” O’Donnell said, “They look for focus on a language and musical ability”.

Studying vocal performance means she will take voice and performance lessons and learn in depth about singing pronunciation, teaching music, working in the music industry, and more. “I would be taking classes like French diction, Spanish diction, or basically any language diction,” O’Donnell said, “I would have performance credits, and at most schools also have private voice lessons every week.”

O’Donnell was inspired by the many people in the music community at Prep to pursue this path in life. She points to role models such as music teacher Mr. Weeks and her peers in choir and theater who showed her studying music was possible and the importance of passion for music. “The way Mr. Weeks put it made a lot of sense, he said music majors are simultaneously the least likely and most likely to switch their major, and I couldn’t see myself doing anything else,” Molly said.

Looking to the future, O’Donnell hopes to achieve a career as a member of a professional, touring choir. This is an ambitious end goal on her journey in choral voice, and O’Donnell knows that this journey will not be a linear one. “Obviously, it is hard to do things with a performance degree,” O’Donnell said, “but, there’s a lot of options to perform, teach, arrange.” O’Donnell is still waiting to hear back from a few schools, but wherever she ends up it can be said for certain that her passion for music will only continue to flourish.

Rosie Huddleston has taken part in the one acts and the musical “Grease” here at Prep. Even when she was a little kid, Huddleston has always been passionate about acting. However, it wasn’t until Covid hit that she really started to pursue it. “The whole world shut down and so I thought, why wouldn’t I do what I want to do,” Huddleston said.

Outside of school, she started taking acting classes. She puts a lot of focus on the classes and coaching she receives, as she hopes to go into screen acting in the future.

Huddleston’s favorite part of acting is the collaboration aspect of it. She loves the group dynamic and how people get together to create a project. In addition to the collaboration, Huddleston of course enjoys the acting itself; “The thing for me that I love about it is it’s an art form that’s just so expressive. You really learn a lot about yourself, when you’re doing it, and you get to notice a lot of different perspectives” Huddleston said.

Huddleston cast a wide net, applying to colleges all across the country. She is applying to both BFA (Bachelor of Fine Arts) and BA (Bachelor of Arts) Programs. She has auditioned for a couple of programs already and is preparing to audition for more in February.