My Casting Story: Jeevan Braich in ‘Starlight Express’

Hi Jeevan! Congratulations on your award for Best Professional Debut Performance at the WhatsOnStage Awards. How does it feel to have been recognised?

It’s a massive honour, one which I still have not come down from. 

I think often we’re credited in the industry when you’ve paid your dues, when you’ve established yourself and you’ve put something out there that’s amazing. But this award was for the people who are scary and brave, who are getting their foot through the door. And to be recognised for that, I think, is such an honour.

How did you first become involved with ‘Starlight Express’?

For me, it was a bit of an unorthodox route. I was lucky enough to be spotted on TikTok, which is so weird to be able to say. I was singing songs and musical theatre and covers, and I landed on a casting director’s For You page. And then they approached me and said, “Would you like to audition?” And I said, “Absolutely.”

What was the audition process for ‘Starlight Express’?

Once I was at the audition, then it was all normal. I think TikTok was great because it got me that route in, but then the actual audition process was the same. It was really long for some people, quite short for some people. We did a skate round. There were loads of variables and factors we had to consider. 

Being there in the finals, I was the anomaly. I really thought, “Okay, they’re not going to go for me.” I remember [everyone else] talking about their ages and everyone was 30. I remember doing some research about Ray Shell, the original ‘Rusty’, and he was about 30 when he played it. And I was like, “Right, okay, so I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ll get on the Tube back.” 

I guess it worked in my favour. But it was very scary, and I think not having that experience made me say loads of things in my brain, but it’s all part of it and it worked out in the end.

You’d never roller-skated before getting the role of ‘Rusty’. What sort of training did you have to do to learn this skill?

I did not skate at all. They took us to this place that we called Skate School, and [for] up 12 to 14 weeks-ish, we learnt the hard way how to skate.

It wasn’t a nice little roller rink with lights and music. It was the ins and outs of everything from the skate to your mentality, to footwork, to laces, to this, to that. It was blood, sweat and tears. But it made us so qualified that we know everything we need to know for anything.

Starlight Express is phenomenal. The set design that was done by Tim Hadley still shocks me because it’s so immersive while also being humongous. Sometimes the lighting will change in the show and I’ll see just how many people there are and I’ll go, “Wow, I don’t know how they’ve managed to do that so brilliantly because my mind could never even think of that.”

We have this massive what we call ‘bowl’, which is just the big ramp, which I’m going to say is six feet because it’s taller than me. And it’s very daunting and I love the reaction when we go backwards and forwards and when some people flip over it and stuff like that. It’s awesome. I love it.

Between roller-skating and singing, ‘Starlight Express’ is a very physically demanding show. How do you warm up physically and vocally before the show?

We have amazing teams from every department who help us warm up. We do a physical, a vocal, and then a skating warm-up, and they essentially tie in together because when you’re warm in one area, you’ll feel more comfortable in the others. 

Now I feel we’ve come to a point where we probably don’t like singing when we’re not on the skates. I just feel used to it now. We’re used to doing all three, so we warm all of them up to make sure we can do the best job.

How do you look after yourself between performances?

Everyone has their own routine. For me, I like to go into my dressing room and have some me time. I put on a TV show and I eat my lunch and I just like to unwind like that. That little bit of downtime [is] how I’ll make sure I’m ready for the next show, whether that’s later in the evening or the next day. 

It’s always good to get into the mentality of having some time for yourself and letting your whole body relax. I think a big part of that is also just a rested brain.

What are your tips for staying healthy and preventing burnout as a performer?

Remember that in this day and age, your phone battery is not always going to be 100%. So, why should your body? As long as you’re not overworking yourself and your brain, it’s okay to have those moments where you’re like, “I’m too tired to do anything. I want to stay in bed. I want to get in the bath.” It’s great to do that. That in itself is recharging yourself. 

To avoid burnout, especially in Starlight Express, what I found is reminding myself that mentality is the biggest thing. Even if my body is tired, my voice is tired, if my brain does something very small, like just acknowledges it and accepts it and says, “Today’s going to be a day where I do feel more tired, I do feel a little less prepared, and that’s okay.”

As long as my brain’s not saying, “It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine. Carry on, carry on, carry on.” Because that is not going to help anyone, least of all yourself. So, for me, mentality and just checking in with yourself and allowing your brain to have every end of the spectrum. It’s not always going to be, “I feel fine and happy and I can do three shows if I wanted to today.” It’s also checking yourself and saying, “I don’t feel my best.”

I’m not going to try and come up with a solution right then and there, but I’d say acceptance is such a big thing and acknowledgement of it. Being in denial about where you are and your tired levels and stuff will make you more tired because you’re using more brain power. So, I’d say to prevent burnout, for me, I check in with my mentality and hope that the happier and healthier the brain is, everything else slowly should start to recharge.

Does performing in roller-skates come with extra challenges?

Oh, absolutely! It means that we can never shut off. My friends who are in the West End, they’ll say, “If I’m at the back of the stage, I can stand there.” They don’t switch off, but they’re doing the show while relaxing just a little bit.

But with skates, it’s not just for your own safety, but for everyone else’s, because if one person goes, we all go down for the most part. So, we can never switch off with it. 

A big part of skating is weight distribution and balance, and if you’re not doing that just while standing normally, you’ll fall down. And that’s something that has become second nature to us. But every so often, you take it for granted and you have a little stumble and you check in and you go, “Oh, my goodness, I switched off.”

Tell us about the costumes from ‘Starlight Express’. They look amazing – are they heavy?

It won for Best Costume [at the WhatsOnStage Awards] by [Gabriella] Slade – an ultimate icon. She is phenomenal. She also did the costumes for Six, so you can see some similarities. The costumes are what really get us. They look phenomenal, and we have lights and batteries, and I’ve got smoke machines coming out of mine, it does every little trick in the book. It is really, really iconic, and it draws your eye.

It’s so colourful. They’re so wacky, they’re so wild. They’re perfect though. And I think it shows all of the creative team’s minds because to be able to create costumes that we can move in, that we’ve got to go up and down and do all of the spins and this and that, it takes a village to put that together. And Gabby Slade and all of her village came through and delivered so beautifully. 

The costumes are probably one of my favourite things. They are really heavy. Some are lighter than the others. There’s always going to be one part of a costume that’s a bit awkward, but we work around it and you get used to it. For me, it’s my backpack that I have. It’s really heavy! But apart from that, it’s fine. You get used to it and the audiences love it so we love it too.

They’ve integrated our personal protection into it. So, all of our elbow pads, our wrist guards, all of that, because we’ve got to stay safe as well. If we do fall, we just bounce right back up. So, it’s beautiful and amazing while also being safe and productive.

How did it feel making your professional stage debut in an iconic show like ‘Starlight Express’?

Very daunting, especially after coming back to London after so long, and the fact that so many people know it because it’s iconic. It was daunting, it had its challenges, and then you just have to remind yourself that you got that part for a reason. 

Everyone around you is in the same boat as well. We’re not playing the same characters, we’re all in the boat of we’re going to go out and smash this new revival. And we’ve got so many debuts as well. They were just as scared as I was. It’s that unity of sticking together in the scary times that actually made us go, “I can do this because we’ve got each other.” So that’s how I got through it, just because of the cast mainly.

With skates and learning, we’ve trauma-bonded together. Even if people leave, we’re going to be connected for quite a long time.

What’s your favourite moment from the show?

I sing a song called ‘I am the Starlight’, and that song is so impactful. To me, it’s a beautiful moment in the show when there are loads of stars and I’m up on this platform. Despite all that, just the fact that the lyrics are like, ‘I can achieve anything’, it really reminds you if you put your mind to whatever you want, the only person that really needs to believe in you is you.

Once you have that self-belief, once you find that in everyday human life, you can do whatever you want to do. I think that moment, specifically to me, is just a great reminder. If I leave Starlight Express, I’m going to have to sing that to myself every day again, just to remind myself to get in the habit of it.

Jeevan singing ‘I Am the Starlight’ in ‘Starlight Express’ / Image credit: Pamela Raith

What made you first want to become an actor?

I think I always knew I was going to do something creative. My sister is four years older than me, and she was singing at the dinner table every night, so I started singing at the dinner table every night. And then it stuck and I got into singing, and then I got into acting, and then I got into both of them together.

From a very early age, singing around a dinner table, I went, “I need to be doing this on stage. That’s what I want to do.” Singing to my parents is one thing, and then singing in front of an audience of thousands is the dream for me. It was something that I knew quite early on.

Could you share your journey of becoming a musical theatre performer with us?

A big beauty of it is finding that relatability within your character, which is hard because my character is a singing train, but I’d say there are some elements that make me go, “I am.” I find myself being ‘Rusty’, whether it’s the young underdog who’s naive, or whether it’s someone who’s been oppressed and battled hardship and really tried to succeed no matter what.

For me, that is what’s made this journey what it is. As much as I love it, it’s one thing to be able to say, “I stand on the stage and I sing in front of people,” but then it’s another thing to say, “I stand on the stage singing in front of people with a character that means the world to me, that I relate to.” 

My journey has gone from a kid who struggled in life very early on, to someone [for whom] music and acting in the creative industry was my outlet.

I had kind of a rough early childhood, and without even realising that the arts and the creative side was something that I latched onto. And those were the stepping stones that eventually got me into applying for auditions or putting covers out. That outlet of music and playing piano and singing made me go, “Okay, I’m just going to put myself out there, see what happens.” And then I ended up in Starlight Express. 

Could you tell us about your experience training with National Youth Theatre?

I was so happy to be part of the National Youth Theatre because acting is something I love so much, especially straight acting. It’s my dream to do a play – my ultimate dream. Even just to be a serious actor – I want to establish myself as that. National Youth Theatre was that first moment that made me go, “Absolutely.” 

I did my course the year of Covid-19, so all of ours was online. I remember going in thinking, “Okay, it’s all going to be on-screen. It’s not like the normal version. So, how’s this going to go?” I wouldn’t care if it was in-person or on-screen – I’d do it a thousand times again! It was so amazing. 

It didn’t feel like a school. It didn’t even feel like a workshop – it felt natural. It felt like creative beings coming together and showing their love for something and creating this beautiful piece of artwork and collaborating and giving each other ideas. I’m still in contact with all of them and we share our work and support each other. That, to me, is the industry. 

We were all people who had done a few classes, or were studying, or were established. Coming together with that many people and just showing our love is what has made National Youth Theatre probably one of the highlights of my acting journey thus far. I could not recommend it more.

How important is maintaining relationships and connections within the industry?

Networking is a big thing because you never know where people are going to end up and you never know who you’re going to meet and who’s going to be helpful to you. I hear that a lot from people giving me advice, talking about, “You should always be nice to this person because one day they might…” And I’m like, “You could have stopped the sentence after, ‘You should always be nice to people.'”

It doesn’t matter where they end up or if they’re going to give you a favour because you were nice to them. Just be nice to them anyway. Genuine people find each other and they stick together. There were so many genuine people in that course that I’m seeing venture into different art. Some have gone into art, some have gone into design, some have gone into stage management, some have gone into writing.

It’s just that beauty of having a friend in a different category that, one day, I might bring up and go, “Hi, how is this doing? And, by the way, I heard someone has an opening for… and I mentioned you.” It’s a great support system to have. I don’t think I want to limit myself to just, “Okay. Well, I’m an actor so I’m only going to hang out with my actor friends.”

This industry is so vast and it’s brilliant to make as many connections and network as much as possible. It’s easy for me because I’m a social butterfly and I don’t stop talking, but it’s such a beautiful thing to have that interdimensional genre of friendships.

When we’re in a show or doing a performance or a workshop, every department is going to come together to make it work in the end. 

You were discovered through TikTok. Do you believe in making your own opportunities?

I think putting yourself out there is scary. I can understand 100% why some people would think [TikTok] is too out there, but you really do miss 100% of the opportunities you don’t take. I was saying to myself, “Okay, I’m going to put a cover out that might get 10 likes. One of those likes might be a casting director.” And it happened. 

That wasn’t my intention from the start. I just did it because I like seeing covers and I wanted the people that followed me to see that, but it just so happened that it landed on the right person’s page. That might not happen, but at the end of the day, all you would be losing is nothing. All you’re doing is putting your repertoire out there, showing people what you can do.

It’s about having that braveness and that boldness to say, “I’m going to put myself out there because what’s the harm?” I think that’s a big one. Especially in the last two years, I developed a mentality that’s gone, “YOLO,” and just do it. We need to have that back because I think with a big rise of social media and a lot of safety support networks, it’s easy, especially for us in this generation, to go, “I’m just going to wait.” I was doing that as well. But what’s the point of waiting? Don’t wait for someone else to knock on your door. Go out and knock their own door down because then there’s the fun of it. Then you get to say that you did that. You didn’t wait for anyone else. You did that yourself.

Sometimes people will talk to me about it and they’ll be like, “Oh, wow, you really did that? You must feel really big about yourself.” And I’m like, “Yes.” But also, to me – especially in this industry, that is the bare minimum. I’m not going to be naive. There are multiple people out there who can act better than me and sing better than me and definitely dance better than me.

But the only difference is that I just try to show my face as much as possible. They have every right to do the exact same. There’s always going to be someone out there who is better than you at something, but that shouldn’t stop you [from] putting yourself out there. It’s that mentality which made me go, “Okay, I’m just going to wait.”

The people who are making and deciding things are just going to find the person who is putting themself out there. They’re not going to knock on a random door and hope that you can sing, dance and act, and then you go, “Oh, yeah, I can. Great. That’s my golden ticket.” You’ve got to go out and make it for yourself, I think.

What tips do you have for using social media as a performer?

My professional and personal [stuff] is all in one account, then some friends have a personal and professional one and it works brilliantly for them. I think it really depends [on] where your mind is and how closely you want to submerge yourself.

With social media, today especially, it’s very easy to get hooked into it and also get brought down by it. It can be the most beautiful but also the most traumatic place ever. Any tips I’d give is to remember what you’re showing online, show that in real life too. Be a passionate person in-person as well as [on] social media.

It’s easy for me to say [after] getting scouted from social media, but a lot of the time, a lot of people my age especially think if their Instagram looks really pretty and all of that, then a casting director will look at it and go, “Okay, that’s what I want.” But a lot of the time it is talent-based. Remind yourself [to] back it up with the amazing talent that you’ve got.

Find that balance of where it is healthy because it’s really easy to teeter from either side. Some people talk about how awful [social media] is, but it is also such a gift, and you are not going to do yourself any harm by putting yourself out there.

What’s next for you?

This industry is turbulent in the best way. It’s chaotic, and you’ve got to have the ability to say something might not come the very second I leave. But that’s okay because I always say we’re all on our own path. When something is right and when it’s meant to happen, it’s going to happen, and the rewards will be bucketful. 

I really want to establish myself as an actor, because singing is something which I love so much and I want to be able to come back and do a really mature role. Especially in musical theatre, I’m seeing so many roles that make me go, “Oh, I really want to do that. I wouldn’t be able to do that for about 10 years though.” That, to me, is exciting. I’ve got so much time to maybe venture out into different genres and do as much as possible. So, for me, I really want to act.

Finally, what would be your dream role?

I like to say he’s not been created yet, only because I love sinking my teeth into something that is very bold and daring and creatively mad. I know that something’s going to come along that makes me go, “Okay, I get to put my interpretation on this,” and do something that is so wild and creative, even if it’s the most serious character ever. 

I’d say my dream role is something fresh, something new, something that I can put my spin on, and I’ll know it when I see it, and then I will beg everyone to say, “Please, can I be that character?” That’s such a big part of it. 

I really want to do something, even if it’s, for example, in a revival – something that really pushes the boundaries and makes me go, “Okay, this is up to me. I’ve got to shape this character and put that pressure on myself and give the best version of that character I can.” If he’s already been created, then brilliant. If he’s not, then I look forward to meeting him.

Thank you, Jeevan, for sharing your experience and advice with us! Starlight Express is on at the Troubador Wembley Park Theatre now.

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