When I was 9, I auditioned for an arts school in Toronto with a few of my friends. The sole reason we auditioned was that we found out you got to miss a couple days of school to do the audition. Without actually wanting to go to arts school, I accidentally got in. My parents encouraged me to try it, and I ended falling in love with performing.
Jake Epstein
The very first concert I ever went to was a Green Day concert when I was 12 years old, at the Hershey Centre in Mississauga, Ont., and I remember right after seeing them perform I started a band, and I wanted to get up in front of people and start performing. Ten years later, to be on the Green Day 'American Idiot' tour is really awesome.
I wanted to be a soccer player. And then I wanted to be a rabbi.
If you'd ever told me that my Broadway debut would be playing Spider-Man, I would have laughed in your face.
Obviously, doing TV and doing theater are completely different because they're two totally different mediums. On stage, you worry about your voice and how you move physically. On TV, something like an eye twitch is what they could be looking for from you because it's so contained.
'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow,' if you go through the lyrics, is such a haunting melody, and the words are, for a pop song, pretty deep and dark.
What's cool about Spider-Man is that it's everybody - anyone, you put on the suit, anyone believes that you're Spider-Man. That's what's charming about the character. He's anyone. He's a huge nerd that ends up being this huge superhero.
I played the drums, and I was in a band called Funkasaurus Rex in Toronto. When I left for school, it became hard to play as frequently.
I came from a huge extended family of musicians.
The fact is, 'Billy Elliot' is an incredible show, for any age and any gender. 'Degrassi' fans would absolutely fall in love with 'Billy Elliot.'
I really love young Tom Hanks. He's just one of my favorites. He's a great, quirky every-man. I also love Zach Braff. I really love actors that are quirky and interesting, that sort of try to portray 'normal' people.
I was a jock, hardcore sports all the way down the line, but I heard that if you auditioned for this arts school, you got time off school, and that sounded good to me.
I'm a pretty upbeat person. I think I sometimes get cast as these brooding types because I bring light and joy, which hopefully makes them more likable.
I love singing, but I feel very naked and very vulnerable when I'm singing sometimes. With acting, I always think that it doesn't matter what you are as long as you're truthful in that moment. But with singing, you always have to hit the note. It's not like you can just go, 'Oh, it doesn't really matter what note you sing!'
I am a ordinary teenager. I fall in love like everyone else.
I try to keep my private life private.
My dad is a huge folk music fan, so growing up, there were always records playing in my house. Carole King, James Taylor, Simon and Garfunkel, the Beatles - I grew up with this music, and I was aware of how special this music was to a lot of people.
I did 'Degrassi' for five years in Toronto, and I made the decision to quit the show to go to theatre school, which a lot of people thought I was really crazy to do, but it was one of those major decisions in my life that I haven't regretted - hopefully I won't! I really wanted to go to school.
There's just nothing funnier or crazier than that - doing your Broadway debut as Spider-Man in 'Spider-Man' the musical. It was, like, the last thing I could have ever possibly imagined happening. I mean, I would tell people I was playing Spider-Man, and people would just break out laughing because it was so ridiculous!
My sis, Gabi, is also an actor and singer.
When I was 12, I played the Artful Dodger in Cameron McKintosh's production of 'Oliver!' when it came to Toronto. Just getting the role shocked my whole family, and I don't think I realized until then just how much I loved getting up in front of people and performing.
I am definitely someone who needs to take a second by myself and stretch and breathe before a show.
The longer I've been doing this, the more I've realized that you have no idea what kinds of roles are possible for you - dream roles can take you by surprise. That being said, I need to play Hamlet one day. I'd also love to be in a play that I have written myself.
I grew up reading comics. I was primarily an 'X-Men' fan, but I definitely dressed up as Spider-Man for Halloween when I was, like, 12 years old. Maybe younger than that.
I grew up in Canada and was a huge Spider-Man fan, and never thought of Spider-Man as an American hero.
If I'm ever at a mall or some kind of place where there's a lot of younger girls, some people will recognize me from 'Degrassi.' But then it won't happen for a long time. It's funny - it happens more here in the States than it does in Canada.
I won the family lottery. I come from the best family in the world.
I was obsessed with X-Men as a kid, and I would have to go and play every last one of them. My sister was obsessed with Barbies. So we would create these X-Men-Barbie combos and perform weird musicals where they interacted with each other.
I was very spiritual as a kid. I think I felt and thought about things a lot more deeply than most of the other kids my age. I wanted to help people.
I'm always surprised at how many people remember me from 'Degrassi.'
For those that don't know much about 'American Idiot' or Green Day, just know that it's my generation's The Who's 'Tommy' or Pink Floyd's 'The Wall.' It was an album that really spoke to a generation. The theatrical show encapsulates that feeling and brings it to an even wider audience.
I'm at the National Theatre School, which is like the Juilliard of Canada.
In Montreal, there is a friend of mine at school who is a jazz pianist with an amazing voice, and we sort of have this fusion/soul/R&B/folk music kind of thing. We've been keeping it low-key and opening for some friends.
The kids all literally think I'm Spider-Man, and they ask me how I shoot my webs. It's flattering and crazy, but it's Spider-Man they're in awe of, not Jake Epstein.
The dream is to originate a role in a show on Broadway. That's the ultimate goal.
