Two Kentucky high school students will head to New York City later this month for the National High School Musical Theater Awards.
The prestigious Jimmy Awards showcase the best in high school musical theater. And for too long, Kentucky and Southern Indiana theater programs have been underrepresented on the national stage, said Nick Covault, vice president of education and community at the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts.
KPA sent a team of adjudicators to high schools across the state to view musical theater performances. Students from 16 high schools celebrated an array of accomplishments at the inaugural Bradley Awards in Louisville on Sunday.
The awards honored students for acting, dance, ensemble performance, technical execution and behind the scenes work.
“We really saw an opportunity to help add on to the community of theater arts education, help continue inspiring folks to realize the value of arts education and help folks continue to understand how important it is to support young artists in our region,” Nick Covault, vice president of education and community at KPA, said.
Winners of the best leading actor and actress will head to New York for the Jimmy Awards.
duPont Manual Youth Performing Arts School rising senior Kennedy Julian won best actress in a leading role for her role as Sally Brown in “You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.”
“At first it didn't feel real,” Julian said. “It took me the longest to comprehend that I was actually getting to do this.”
Julian said she’s acted for most of her life. She said she could never sit still when she was younger.
“[My mom] put me into dance classes at Dance Sensation Studios, and then I started taking voice lessons, and I think my love of musical theater grew from there, and I started auditioning for community theater,” Julian said.
Julian said she appreciates that the Bradley Awards took time to award everyone who makes a production possible, like those doing lighting, sound and set design.
“Our show would have not been possible without our technical staff,” Julian said. “Our person who ran our tracks was so amazing, so kind, and just did a killer job with them, as well as our light team and our set. They just did such a wonderful job.”
Best actor in a lead role winner Carson Chesnut is a rising junior at McCracken County High School. He won for his depiction of Will Bloom in a production of “Big Fish.”
“I know that a lot of people weren't really putting McCracken County on the map, but I think that our performance was incredible, and I think that our hard work showed for it,” Chesnut said. “It was awesome that we got to show that McCracken County isn't just a public school, but it's a very incredible arts program as well.”
Chesnut said he tried new hobbies as a child and theater was the one that stuck.
“It really allows me to be myself and truly express myself in ways that I didn't know that I could do. Like, I can be involved in a second home and just be myself around people that love the same things that I love,” Chesnut said.
He hopes the Bradley Awards will show the importance of theater programs and the arts, generally.
“People who don't have access to theater don't have access to doing what they love, and they won't have access to being with people that they love,” Chesnut said.
Both Chesnut and Julian said participating in theater has had a huge impact on their education and who they are.
“Theater is just so important, everybody needs to go to theater, whether they're watching theater or they're in theater classes,” Julian said. “I think theater is just so important for the world because theater tells stories that need to be told, that sometimes are hard to tell in a just talking manner.”
The Jimmy Awards will be on June 23. While in New York, Chestnut and Julian will be able to participate in masterclasses and training from musical theater professionals.
