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Bermuda’s Broadway star’s advice: ‘You have to go for it’

Small town girl in the big city: BHS alumnae Rebecca Faulkenberry is enjoying her career in the limelight as cast member of the musical Rock of Ages now touring in cities in the United States.<I></I>

Bermudian Rebecca Faulkenberry, who was constantly singing and being a ‘drama queen’ as a child, has turned into a hit Broadway musical star. As a former Bermuda High School for Girls student, she says that all the school productions, regardless of the size of her role, the singing in assembly and even the debate team, influenced and helped with her career.Currently she is starring in ‘Rock of Ages,’ alongside previous American Idol winner Constantine Maroulis, while they are touring several different countries, which gives her a tremendously full schedule.“There’s no such thing as a weekend in the theatre! Our schedule is Monday night, Tuesday night, day off Wednesday, Thursday night, Friday night, double Saturday, double Sunday,” stated the busy Rebecca.Eight performances a week can keep you very active during your week. Usually in the day to rest her voice, she does not talk, to save her vocal energy for the nighttime performances where she belts out Rock tunes such as ‘Here I go Again’, ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ and many more.Faulkenberry has been in many different plays/musicals. “I found two of my best friends in the world when I was doing High School Musical in London. I had the smallest part in a play I did at the Royal Court called “Aunt Dan and Lemon”, but I had dyed red hair and walked around in the most fabulous dress drinking a martini and smoking a cigarette, and then in ‘Rock of Ages’ we’re belting out rock tunes with the audience going absolutely crazy every night, but each show has its perks for different reasons,” she declared.Outside of the theatre, she claims to have a very broad range of music choice that consists of soul music, where she can hear the rich but subtle vocal choices, and lots of reggae tunes as well, to remind her of back home on the rock. Faulkenberry enjoys listening to Adele, Jessie J and India Arie, just to name a few. To keep fit, she often goes to the gym to make sure she is in shape for those tiny costumes in ‘Rock of Ages’!Faulkenberry hopes to stay in the Society of Dramatic Arts, as she grows older, and states that there is still so much more that she aims to achieve.Many people are dreaming to be actresses/actors and to be on Broadway and Faulkenberry has this advice, “Make sure you absolutely adore it, because it is a very difficult career and everyone, even incredibly successful people, go through periods when they’re out of work or dealing with rejection ... but if you’re going to do it, full out go for it, put in all the time for training and practice so you’re as best prepared as you can be, and then just be confident and give it a really good go. There’s no point tip toeing around it. It’s not going to come to you; you have to go for it.”