Awestruck, Veronica Fenoglio-Kushera witnessed her first Broadway performance act out on stage, promising her 9-year-old self that she would be the one up there one day.

“I remember just watching him and that being the most spectacular thing,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “I love being able to go on stage and be whoever you want, the outside world doesn’t affect you, I loved it so much.”

Fenoglio-Kushera started doing professional theatre outside of school grounds in order to pursue her dream.

“I was taking my first musical theatre class, and it was just amazing,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “it was just an indescribable feeling of, like, pure happiness.”

Fenoglio-Kushera started auditioning for many types of theatre shows from a young age.

“I know a bunch of theatres around the place because along the way I was able to know a lot of great actors,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “They’ll give recommendations on theatres.”

Driving her from one audition to another, Fenoglio-Kushera said her mother is her biggest supporter.

“Luckily I have an amazing mother who always drives me around,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “She is lovely and always will play pump-up music in the car.”

Going to various types of auditions, Fenoglio-Kushera said she always experiences some sort of nervousness every time she goes.

“It’s not nerves, it’s excitement and because the feelings you feel when you’re nervous are the exact same feelings you get when you’re excited,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “So I am training my brain not to be nervous.”

Auditioning for so many roles, it’s inevitable that there were some that Fenoglio-Kushera experienced failures along the way.

“I’m working on the failed auditions not getting to me but sometimes they suck,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. ” Like it hurts to be rejected over and over and over again even if it was because of something that was completely out of my control.”

Out of some of the auditions she went through successfully, Fenoglio-Kushera recently landed a role for a Charlie Brown role.

“It’s going really well, I am really excited about it,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. ” It’s hard because there are only six people in the cast but it’s a lot of fun.”

Due to the extensive hours that are required to put into rehearsing and presenting the play, Fenoglio-Kushera said it has affected her school life and work.

“Theatre very much dictates my life at every given point,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. ” I have amazing teachers who are willing to adjust and accommodate but I try to get my work done early because for some shows I do have to miss school periods.”

While Fenoglio-Kushera loves theatre and acting, she said that there are times when she considers quitting.

“Sometimes the people aren’t always the nicest, thinking they are inferior to everyone else,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “The hours pulling are hard on school because you get there, rehearse for 5 hours straight and you go home and do homework till midnight and sleep till 6 so that kind of sucks some days.”

While she mentions it is tough, she also says that her friends and family members make sure to remind her of all the good things and talk her back into it.

“Every beat of confidence that I get into me is like, is it worth it,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “But then I also remember that I love doing what I do, it’s one of the greatest joys of my life.”

Despite many actors not going to college, Fenoglio-Kushera said she wants to go to college at some given point.

“I get a little confused about what I want to do in the future,” Fenoglio-Kushera said. “I like theatre but I also want to go into costume design, I guess we will have to see when I get there.”