WEST SIDE STORY
Dana Hunter will take to the stage where she dreamt she would one day perform
Prince Albert’s Dana Hunter will be among the cast to bring the big production to TCU Place this weekend.
Like so many little girls, Dana Hunter wanted to become a marine biologist. But that was just a momentary detour from her real dream, becoming a performer.
“I’ve always been so drawn to the performing arts. It’s so ingrained as a fibre of my being,” she said.
Hunter grew up dancing, singing and acting in local productions in Prince Albert. Every year, her father would buy her a ticket to a touring Broadway show in Saskatoon. She grew up watching actors on the TCU Place stage and knew she wanted to be one of them. She got a taste for the spotlight as a student dancer in a production of the Alberta Ballet’s Nutcracker.
Now a professional actor, Hunter will return to her home province and the TCU Place stage as part of the touring production of West Side Story.
As a musical theatre performer one has to dance, act and sing, but those aren’t the only skills necessary to do well in show business. Hunter underwent a four-month audition process to land her West Side Story role as Fernanda, one of the Shark girls. Four hundred women attended the first audition for just four roles.
“It’s a whole other skill to handle the pressure,” she said. “It can be pretty nerve-racking. But I keep the hope and doing whatever I can, if it’s continuing to study and going to dance lessons, working on the material and my Spanish accent, so I’m prepared.”
Hunter remembers being younger and trying to mimic the claps in America and the snaps in Cool, but said she has a deeper appreciation for the iconic story now that she’s in the show.
“Through the audition process and the rehearsal process I’ve become even closer to the show. So much more of the brilliance and majesty of the show has opened up to me,” she said.
Hunter was leaving a dance class at renowned dance studio Alvin Ailey when she got the happy call from the show’s casting director.
She called her mom, who still lives in Prince Albert, to relay the good news.
“I was screaming and jumping. I was so excited. I called my mom and then we screamed and then I cried because I was so happy,” said Hunter.
Hunter left Saskatchewan after high school to attend musical theatre school in Victoria. She then moved to Vancouver, spent some time in Japan and eventually settled in New York City to pursue her dream.
Even though she’s landing roles, Hunter is a constant student of musical theatre. The last time she was home in New York she went to five shows. She went to Puerto Rico during some time off from West Side Story to work on her Spanish and learn about the culture.
“I’m obsessed with it,” she said of her career.
In addition to playing Fernanda, who is happy to be in America, Hunter also covers the role of Rosalia, who would rather return home to Puerto Rico.
Hunter can relate to both characters. She has fallen in love with New York, but still feels connected to her home.
“I always say I’m a proud New Yorker and a Saskatchewan girl at heart,” she said.
She hasn’t performed in Saskatchewan for several years, but has returned to Prince Albert to do some teaching. Hunter is understandably excited and nervous to perform for family and friends in such a well-known show.
West Side Story tells the tragic tale of star-crossed lovers Tony and Maria and features songs like Tonight, America and I Feel Pretty.