From Fredericton to the bright lights, N.B. actor shares highs, lows of making it in musical theatre
Rose Messenger, 23, has spent the last several months on a Canadian contract in Titanique
Rose Messenger doesn't remember a time in her life when she didn't want to be an actor.
The 23-year-old grew up in Fredericton attending the Theatre New Brunswick school and doing shows at Fredericton High School.
After graduating, she attended university in Cincinnati, before jetting off to New York City to try to make it in her chosen field.
And for the last several months, she's been living out her dream in another big theatre hub.
"If you had asked me less than a year ago if this is where I thought I would be … I would say, 'No way,'" Messenger said.
For the last few months, she has been performing with the small cast of Titanique, a musical comedy about the movie Titanic, told through the eyes of Céline Dion.
The Canadian version of the off-Broadway show started in Montreal and is now at the Ed Mirvish Theatre in Toronto — a spot that Messenger calls a dream for any aspiring Canadian musical theatre actor.
Messenger plays one of Dion's background vocalists, but she also understudies the actors who play Dion, Rose and the Unsinkable Molly Brown. She's actually gone on for several performances as Brown.
"It's my first time understudying multiple roles and it's a cool feeling of, you know, you may never get to do the character, but you've done all the work and you've done all the preparation," she said.
"Once you have the chance to do it several times, you really discover your character in front of the audience. And it's weird — you rehearse in front of an audience as an understudy."
And while the experience of working on a show for many months has been a rewarding one, Titanique will close on Jan. 19, meaning Messenger is back on the job market, and back to the constant whirlwind of auditions.
The life of an actor can be inconsistent.
After graduating from university, she landed her first contract in Anne & Gilbert, on Prince Edward Island, before deciding to move to New York.
Immediately, Messenger said she started working three jobs to survive, being thrust into the reality of an actor trying to land the next contract.
"You work a morning shift at somewhere, and then you go to your audition in the afternoon and try to act like … all you do is act every day," she said.
"And then you go to your night shift at night, and you go to sleep and do the same thing over and over again."
It paid off for Messenger. She booked a job in Connecticut where she worked alongside some Broadway veterans — until that, too, came to an end.
"When that show finished, again, my mom was getting a lot of, you know, crying phone calls of ... what's next for me," said Messenger.
"I think, for anyone … that goes to theatre school, specifically, you get this idea in your head like, 'Oh, I'm gonna leave school and I'm gonna book, you know, this movie, or I'm gonna book this job, or I'm gonna, you know, become a star immediately.
"It's just not like that for 99 per cent of the people that try to do this."
As her current contract winds down, Messenger said she plans to visit family back home in New Brunswick before hopefully going back to New York to start the job hunt all over again.
But over the last few years, she's learned the importance of separating her sense of self-worth from the job.
And she's taken up hobbies and friends outside of theatre, as a way to disconnect from the industry.
"It's always just kind of a roller coaster. … but you kind of learn to get in the groove of it.
"It's always exciting."
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