Phreshly Squeezed

Degrassi TNG (The Next Generation) is one of my guilty pleasures. I can’t wait to go home to Canada so I can watch new episodes -- it’s that bad! Spanning over eight seasons, Degrassi TNG has grown up with a huge cast, many of whom you now see moving onto bigger things (think Shenae Grimes on CW’s 90210 and Aubrey ‘Drake’ Graham with his rapping career). Toronto born Jake Epstein is another member of the Degrassi TNG alumni who have hit it big time!

We remember Epstein played the troubled rockstar, Craig Manning, that picked up everything and left to pursue his music career. Not striking far from his previous role, Epstein plays another dark character. Instead of the television set, we see Epstein on the theater stage as Melchior Gabor of Spring Awakening, a musical depicting the teenage angst of growing up, on the national US tour! Debuted on July 7th at Washington DC’s Kennedy Center, Epstein received rave reviews, including that of Peter Marks of The Washington Post.

Jake Epstein takes on the role of Melchior in Spring Awakening, photo courtesy of Joan Marcus

Watch the promotional video below, which features “Rescue You” performed by Epstein, as well as “Touch Me” performed by other cast members.

Given that I had a six week vacation from school, it would be a shame if I hadn’t done any traveling. After spending my week in Scotland and in the Canary Islands, I jetted off to London, England to spend my remaining week of vacation there.

In addition to doing the tourist activities, such as seeing Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, and Tower Bridge, I also had the chance to attend the London premiere of a musical, Spring Awakening at the Lyric Theatre. Given that the musical’s preview performances were completely sold out, it was pure luck that we were able to get tickets to a showing (honestly, our friend just walked up to the cash and asked if there were any tickets that were not sold, and to our astonishment, there were tickets for our group of four for that night’s show).

My friend, who happens to be a die-hard Spring Awakening friend urged me to take a picture of some fellow that was sitting about two rows ahead of us. It turns out that she had good reason for asking me to take a picture, because it turned out to be Broadway star, Jonathan Groff, who played Melchior in the original Spring Awakening. During intermission, she was able to meet him and snap a picture!

Jonathan Groff of the original Spring Awakening cast with my friend, Sumrah!