13-year-old Queens girl wins theater award

BY ASHA MAHADEVAN

When Colby Christina was 2 years old, she started dancing. She was 4 when her teachers told her she would be a star one day. She took that to heart and decided she wanted to be a performer. Now, at the age of 13, she is going to be awarded the Rising Star trophy at the 42nd Annual Viv Awards, organized by the Audience Development Committee Inc. (Audelco) to celebrate black theater.

Christina is being recognized for her portrayal of Alice in “The Liberation of Mother Goose,” an off-Broadway play. The award, which she will receive on Nov. 17 at a ceremony at Symphony Space in Manhattan, came as a surprise to Christina, but she is excited about it.

“I feel it is for everything I have accomplished and all the hard work I put into the play has paid off,” she said. “To perform at the historic Billie Holiday Theater, it was a privilege.”

Christina, a resident of St. Albans, is an accomplished dancer, singer and actress, and said that with Alice, she got the opportunity to “intertwine all those experiences together and express myself in a full manner.”

In her short career, she has managed to perform at the Museum of Natural History, the Jamaica Performing Arts Theater, the Seeds of Hope Annual Awards Dinner at the Waldorf Astoria and the Kumble Theater, to name a few. At the same time, she is an exceptional student whose favorite subject, she said, is science. She is a high school freshman and an ambassador promoting STEM education. If that wasn’t enough, she has also started the paperwork to fulfill her dream of opening a dance school, called CC Dance Company.

“Time management is key,” she said, explaining how she has managed to achieve so much in so few years. “I’ve learned that over the years.”

Christina is inspired by her parents but said her brother Robert is her role model. “He told me, ‘Stars are born, not made,’” she said. “I live by that every day.”

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