ROCHESTER - The next stop of Evan Williams’ young acting career is Broadway. Evan, a senior at Le Roy Junior-Senior High School, was one of two winners tonight at the Rochester Broadway Theatre League’s “Stars of Tomorrow NYC Bound” competition.
The winners - Hope Galloway of Brighton High School is the other - will represent the Rochester region next month at the National High School Musical Theatre Awards.
The awards, which are also know as The Jimmy Awards, will be presented June 26 at the Minskoff Theatre in New York City.
About 100 student performers from across the country are expected to participate in the Jimmy Awards.
Evan, who plans to attend Point Park University in the fall, and Hope were among 40 student actors from the Greater Rochester area who were vying for a spot at the Jimmys.
Evan had performed Jean Valjean in Le Roy’s spring musical “Les Miserables,” one of the most challenging musicals to stage short of doing an opera.
Each student prepared vocal selections to perform at Stars of Tomorrow NYC Bound, an “American Idol”-style competition in which performers must survive through several rounds of eliminations.
A preliminary round took place May 23. The top 20 performers were announced May 25 and a panel of judges will adjudicate the final two rounds of the competition and choose two performers to send to the Jimmy Awards.
At the Jimmy Awards, students will go through 10 days of musical theater rehearsals, master classes, private coaching and interviews with theater professionals.
Based on their skill level and professional goals, students are eligible for college scholarships, professional internships, career coaching and opportunities for auditions.
The program culminates with a talent showcase at the Jimmy Awards where judges will select two grand-prize winners for the best performance by an actor and best performance by an actress awards.
Evan is the third student actor from the GLOW region to have ever been picked to attend the Jimmys. Jack D’Angelo of Warsaw Central School went in 2019, while Maureen Edwards of Corfu was a junior at Notre Dame High School in Batavia when she was chosen in 2012.
This year’s “Stars of Tomorrow NYC Bound” saw 10 GLOW region students competing.
Students eligible for the competition received recognition at RBTL’s Stars of Tomorrow Recognition Ceremony on May 11 for their performances in the high school musicals.
GLOW-region students who were part of the competition include Emma Davies of Avon High School, Bella Pillittere of Caledonia-Mumford Middle/High School, Aubrey Puccio, Ashlyn Puccio, Evan Williams Cooper Terry and Nathan Yauchzee, all of Le Roy Junior-Senior High School; Annabelle Follman, Lyndonville Central School; Seagan Majchrzak of Medinia Junior-Senior High School, and Emily Mike of Mount Morris Central School.
A preliminary round took place May 23. The top 20 performers were announced May 25 and a panel of judges adjudicated the final two rounds of the competition and choose two performers to send to the Jimmy Awards.
The National High School Musical Theatre Awards was founded in 2009 by Nederlander Alliances LLC, Pittsburgh CLO, and Broadway Education Alliance. The goal of the awards program is to recognize musical theater in schools and inspire the next generation of performs.
“The Jimmy Award” is named in honor of James M. Nederlander, a legendary Broadway theater owner and producer.