A Georgia high school student and a recent high school graduate are headed to New York City in the hopes of being recognized on a national level.
Emily Marx and Trever Arnold are both up for 2023 Jimmy Awards, also known as the National High School Musical Theatre Awards. Held June 26 at the Minskoff Theatre on Broadway, the program aims to inspire the next generation of musical theater performers.
This year, 96 student nominees from 48 regional awards programs around the country will compete for scholarships, honors and awards for best performance by an actor and actress, according to a news release. The nominees will also perform onstage in a talent showcase, with the program being livestreamed on the Jimmy Awards website.
Marx, a rising senior at Denmark High School in Forsyth County and Arnold, who recently graduated from Ringgold High School in Catoosa County, learned they would be competing in the Jimmy Awards after winning best leading actress and actor at the 2023 Georgia High School Musical Theatre Awards, also known as the Shuler Awards. The annual competition is presented by ArtsBridge Foundation, a group that provides arts education and community programs for Georgia students.
“For an organization like ArtsBridge to set out to help young actors and actresses is huge,” Arnold said. “They really go above and beyond in every aspect to make sure us as performers are successful, but also us as people are successful.”
Marx and Arnold said ArtsBridge Director of Arts Education Elizabeth Lenhart called them the day after their Shuler wins to help them start preparing for the Jimmy Awards.
Over the course of about five days, the two young actors prepared their submissions, which included video recordings of song performances and written essays, all while finishing up classes and, for Marx, rehearsing for another show.
“I don’t know how I made it out alive that week,” Marx said during an Instagram Livestream on Artsbridge’s Instagram account with Arnold and 2012 Shuler Award winner Brittany Dankwa. “That was definitely a crazy process.”
Amidst Jimmy Awards prep, the ArtsBridge Foundation hosted Marx and Arnold at Topgolf Atlanta, where they met 2010 Jimmy Award winner Alexandria Payne, who gave them some advice on what to expect.
Payne, an aluma of Tri-Cities High School in East Point, is one of two Jimmy Award winners from Georgia since the program launched in 2009.
Credit: Courtesy of Nicholas Wolaver
Credit: Courtesy of Nicholas Wolaver
The road to the Jimmy Awards
Aspiring actors dream of the day when they can take to the Broadway stage, and for Marx and Arnold, that moment is coming sooner rather than later.
Marx said she always loved to sing, but really began acting in middle school. It all started with her first performance in “Hairspray Junior.”
“I think it just resonated with me, especially living in an area where theater is celebrated,” she said during the Instagram livestream.
Credit: Ben Rose/BenRosePhotography.com
Credit: Ben Rose/BenRosePhotography.com
Arnold, who will attend Savannah College of Art and Design in the fall, said he’s been singing and dancing for as long as he can remember. In his first show, “North Pole Musical,” he took on the role of Dancer the reindeer. His early years laid the groundwork for his Shuler Award-winning role as Jack Kelly in “Newsies.” (Marx won the Shuler for her role as Katharine Pulitzer in a different production of the same show).
“I put in so much work into crafting the character, into every nook and cranny, every part of the show,” Arnold said.
Credit: Ben Rose/BenRosePhotography.com
Credit: Ben Rose/BenRosePhotography.com
New connections
Participating in the Jimmy Awards is an opportunity that will bring the Georgia students into close contact with industry professionals and a new generation of actors, Marx and Arnold said.
“Not only is the future generation of theater going to be there, there’s gonna be people that have been in the industry forever teaching us,” Marx said during the Instagram livestream. “So many different generations are gonna be smashed in a room together, and we’re all gonna share the fact that we love musical theater.”
For Arnold, who will be going to New York for the first time, getting to perform on Broadway will be “more than spectacular.”
“I’m really pushing myself, harder than I’ve ever pushed myself before,” Arnold said. “I did that with my role as Jack Kelly, and I think I’m pushing myself even more now.”
IF YOU WATCH
“Jimmy Awards,” 7:30 p.m. June 26. jimmyawards.com/news.
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