More Than Kids’ Play

The assignment: Interview the four 11-year-old actors who landed the plum roles of Young Simba and Young Nala in Disney’s blockbuster musical “The Lion King,� at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood.

The dread: That the interview would be a quadruple dose of over-handled, over-groomed, self-important, stagy little adults in kid clothes.

The reality: Adrian Diamond, Lisa Tucker, KaRonn A. Henderson and Jazmn are four unjaded, friendly kid-next-door types, albeit unusually talented. Starry-eyed at having been chosen out of upward of 500 young hopefuls to alternate in the roles, they were eager to share the experience--one heady roller coaster of an experience by all accounts.

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In “The Lion King,� with its astonishing visual elements and African rhythms, child actors are key to the first act. They play the lion cubs: Young Simba--prince and heir to majestic King Mufasa--and Young Nala--Simba’s playmate and future wife.

The roles require kids with big, musical voices; kids who can dance up a storm, perform acrobatics, run fleet-footed up and down huge set pieces, fearlessly “fly,� stay on cue while riding enormous, rainbow-colored ostriches and not trip over their lion tails. They must be able to show emotional range, too--from playful exuberance, fear and anger to grief for a king and father.

Adrian, who hails from the Stevenson Ranch community in the Santa Clarita Valley, and Baldwin Hills resident KaRonn are the new Young Simbas; the Young Nalas are Lisa, who is from Anaheim, and Jazmn, who has come a long way--from Florida--to be in the show.

For Adrian, all lean intensity and fervent enthusiasm, “it’s a dream to be part of something this big and this grand.� KaRonn, with an earnest and endearing volubility, opened his long-lashed brown eyes wide to emphasize how excitedly he was “jumping from couch to couch,� when he got the part.

Lisa, her sweet, sunny face framed with a cloud of long dark hair, said that when she was auditioning, “I prayed to God that he would help me get this show and I would just do my best.� Soft-spoken Jazmn, striking with a tumble of glossy black ringlets, said, “I just think it’s really, like, amazing, because I’ve never really been in anything. When I got it, it was like [she screams], ‘oh, my gosh!’ �

“I’ve always wanted to do this, since the day I was born,� Adrian added. “Like Jazmn, I’ve only done, like, school plays and things like that. I just think it’s awesome.�

The budding actors now have many weeks of intense rehearsals and performances under their belts, but each had limited experience before being tapped for the show. KaRonn had done commercials and the former UPN comedy “Shasta,� but had only sung in church. His audition piece was James Weldon Johnson’s landmark anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing,� “the only song I really knew before I started doing this.�

Jazmn had done some public gigs for Radio Disney at festivals, sporting events and elsewhere, but was still shy when it came to singing solo. “It made me nervous and I’d sing low and fade out,� she confided.

Adrian explained that “in my family, we just get up, turn on the radio and just sing and dance. We have a good time in our own living room without any TV or anything, so I’ve been taught that sense of rhythm since I was really small.�

Lisa, meanwhile, was a one-year singing and acting veteran of the Orange County Children’s Theatre. “I’ve been singing since I could talk,� she said, eyes shining. Pre-�Lion King,� her biggest public appearance was at an Angels baseball game, where she sang the national anthem.

Auditioning for the Cast

Auditions, including numerous call-backs, were held between April and June. Kids came to open calls, and others were recommended by schools, dance studios, voice teachers, YMCAs and theaters.

Winnowed down to “maybe 5 or 6� finalists, according to casting director Mark Brandon of New York-based Binder Casting, the final four were chosen by the show’s creative team, headed by Tony Award-winning “Lion King� director, costume designer and mask and puppet co-designer Julie Taymor.

“Especially the boys,� Brandon noted, “they carry the entire first act of the show, and they have to be dynamic personalities who can act, and sing and dance. The girls need a very specific look and to be really strong singers and actresses and be able to move. When you’re talking about an age range of 9 to 12, that’s a lot to ask of a child.�

But “The Lion King� child actors had to have something besides talent, Brandon said. They needed “that indefinable thing,� an appeal that could reach out into a 2,700-plus-seat house like the Pantages. That meant “children who are not necessarily show-biz kids, not trained, coached children. We look for kids who enjoy being kids.�

The chosen four refreshingly fit that description. Sitting in one of the Pantages’ utilitarian rehearsal rooms for their interview, they quickly loosened up, sharing giggles and the camaraderie of their experiences, clearly happy to have friends their own age to hang out with.

How did they prepare for the auditions, especially since none had seen the show? Vocal coaches, to be sure, but parents and siblings were a big help--sometimes inadvertently: Jazmn did “a bunch of practicing with my mom, and my sister would be Simba.� Lisa practiced “in my living room with my mom and dad. I’d just do a whole bunch of lion moves.�

Adrian found inspiration in watching his little brother and sister “play and chase after each other. I tried to take some of that and put it into my performance.� A nifty lion pose came to KaRonn when he got into an angry crouch during a play fight with his sister (“she likes to play beat me up,� he said with a grin.)

His mom, Shirell Henderson, “showed me how to move my arms and legs and stuff.� Mom also took him to a football field to practice when they found out that the part required “all this acrobatic stuff,� KaRonn said. “I would do cartwheels on the grass, and each day we practiced, I got better at it.� He’s determined to nail the back flip, too. “I’m still practicing.�

There have been many challenges since the auditions. One, for Adrian and KaRonn in particular, was to play off the masks and puppets that the principal actors wear or manipulate, and not look at the actors’ faces.

Rufus Bonds Jr. for instance, as Simba’s father, Mufasa, wears a majestic Lion King mask fitted above his face, not over it. John Vickery, as wicked Uncle Scar, has a similar arrangement, except that Vickery can maneuver the Scar mask so that it stretches dramatically and threateningly forward.

If the kids look at the actors’ faces while exchanging dialogue, it will spoil the character illusions.

“The first day in rehearsal, I had no clue that the mask did that,� Adrian said. “It just came at me, and I’m like, gee, that’s scary.�

“You always look at a person when you’re talking to him. But the mask is way up here,� adds KaRonn, pointing above his head, “and you’re not used to looking way up to talk to someone, unless that person’s as tall as Shaq.� (Besides acting, KaRonn’s dream is to one day play for the Lakers.)

He’s grateful to Vickery, he said, who, noticing the trouble KaRonn was having in making the Scar mask his focal point, took him aside. “He had me look at [the mask] for like 10 minutes, so I could get used to it,� KaRonn said. “It worked.�

“I had to practice really hard to get the ‘Nala attitude’ they wanted,� Lisa volunteered. “She’s tough and she doesn’t let anybody get in her way.� Nala’s “happy side,� said Jazmn, reflects her own feelings. “I’m bouncing and I’m smiling because I’m happy and the show makes me happy.�

Despite all the work that continues daily, and even though they know what’s behind the makeup and how the stage magic is done, each finds something different in the show that resonates in a personal way.

For Lisa, it’s the eulogy scene in which Young Nala mourns the loss of her king and her best friend, “because I know how it feels to lose someone you have feelings for.�

Adrian identifies with “the joy and the curiosity that Simba has, ‘cause it kind of feels like me.�

“The thing that feels real to me isn’t sad, it’s scary,� said Jazmn. “It’s the chase.� (The lion cubs are pursued by the villainous Hyenas, Scar’s henchmen.) “I run and I have to be fast, and when you’re scared you have to be fast, so it really feels real to me.�

“They Live in You,� the show’s big father-and-son emotional moment, rings truest for KaRonn, when Mufasa is trying to teach Simba about proper behavior and his heritage as a future monarch.

“It’s just like something your real father would tell you,� he said. “If you did something that you weren’t supposed to do, you know at home that he’s going to talk to you about it. Mufasa is trying to tell Simba the things he knows so that when Mufasa dies, Simba will know and can pick up on it.�

During the interview, the young actors’ parents were an unobtrusive presence. As they listened to their alternately thoughtful and effervescent offspring, there wasn’t a hint of the stage parent stereotype.

Afterward, they took turns talking about what has been both a nerve-racking and a thrilling family experience.

Lucrece Guy, Jazmn’s mom, said that she and her husband decided that she would quit her job and temporarily relocate in Long Beach with Jazmn and Jazmn’s sister, while her husband and son remained in Florida. The family’s bicoastal arrangement is “kind of stressful,� but worth it, she said. “I wanted to support her, so I’m doing it 100%; this is my full-time job.�

The Parents’ Point of View

Helena Diamond said that she took some convincing to involve Adrian in show biz. Persuaded by friends and teachers--and her eager son--she found a manager for him through an ad in L.A. Parent magazine.

“We were totally blind, had no clue,� she said with a laugh. When the manager asked if Adrian could sing, she responded, “ ‘Yeah, I guess.’ I didn’t know.� (Her husband Harold said later that Adrian’s participation depends on him keeping his grades up. The children attend school at the theater with a tutor.)

“The Lion King� was Adrian’s sixth-ever audition.

Lisa’s road to the Pantages began when her father, Stan Tucker, decided she should have professional training after he saw her in the backyard one day, “standing on the diving board and singing to the sky.� Voice lessons led to roles at the Orange County Children’s Theatre, where she learned of “The Lion King� auditions.

For KaRonn to audition was “a natural,� said Jamie Henderson, because he and his wife had first realized their son’s gifts when KaRonn memorized, on his own, everyone’s part in an elementary school production.

Since the “cubs� must be fairly diminutive physically, the young actors, presently so small and lithe, are aware that their days in the show are numbered--six months or so is average, said Brandon; for the same child to play the role for as much as a year is rare.

All Good Things Come to an End

So, there was a bit of wistfulness in the air when these 11-year-olds talked about having fun while it lasts, and about the friends they’ve made, and how “down-to-earth� and just plain nice the whole company is. As his three new friends nodded agreement, KaRonn put it this way, looking down at the table, his voice becoming softer and more hesitant as he spoke:

“This is a Broadway show that a kid can rarely do for a long time, ‘cause he’s going to grow--or she’s going to grow--so I’m just taking it as the opportunity I have, and I’m going to keep on having fun. But when this is over . . . everyone that’s in the cast, I’m going to miss . . . very much.�

BE THERE

“The Lion King,� Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Saturdays, 2 p.m.; Sundays, 1 and 6:30 p.m., with occasional Wednesday matinees. First Wednesday of each month, 2 p.m. Ends Oct. 1, 2001. $12 to $77; VIP tickets, $127. (213) 365-5555, (714) 703-2510.