Jake Epstein

“When I was 9, I auditioned for an arts school in Toronto with a few of my friends. The sole reason we auditioned was that we found out you got to miss a couple days of school to do the audition. Without actually wanting to go to arts school, I accidentally got in. My parents encouraged me to try it, and I ended falling in love with performing.”

“The dream is to originate a role in a show on Broadway. That's the ultimate goal.”

“The very first concert I ever went to was a Green Day concert when I was 12 years old, at the Hershey Centre in Mississauga, Ont., and I remember right after seeing them perform I started a band, and I wanted to get up in front of people and start performing. Ten years later, to be on the Green Day 'American Idiot' tour is really awesome.”

“I'm at the National Theatre School, which is like the Juilliard of Canada.”

“'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow,' if you go through the lyrics, is such a haunting melody, and the words are, for a pop song, pretty deep and dark.”

“When I was 12, I played the Artful Dodger in Cameron McKintosh's production of 'Oliver!' when it came to Toronto. Just getting the role shocked my whole family, and I don't think I realized until then just how much I loved getting up in front of people and performing.”

“If I'm ever at a mall or some kind of place where there's a lot of younger girls, some people will recognize me from 'Degrassi.' But then it won't happen for a long time. It's funny - it happens more here in the States than it does in Canada.”

“I was obsessed with X-Men as a kid, and I would have to go and play every last one of them. My sister was obsessed with Barbies. So we would create these X-Men-Barbie combos and perform weird musicals where they interacted with each other.”

“If you'd ever told me that my Broadway debut would be playing Spider-Man, I would have laughed in your face.”

“I am definitely someone who needs to take a second by myself and stretch and breathe before a show.”

“My dad is a huge folk music fan, so growing up, there were always records playing in my house. Carole King, James Taylor, Simon and Garfunkel, the Beatles - I grew up with this music, and I was aware of how special this music was to a lot of people.”

“I wanted to be a soccer player. And then I wanted to be a rabbi.”

“My sis, Gabi, is also an actor and singer.”

“For those that don't know much about 'American Idiot' or Green Day, just know that it's my generation's The Who's 'Tommy' or Pink Floyd's 'The Wall.' It was an album that really spoke to a generation. The theatrical show encapsulates that feeling and brings it to an even wider audience.”

“The kids all literally think I'm Spider-Man, and they ask me how I shoot my webs. It's flattering and crazy, but it's Spider-Man they're in awe of, not Jake Epstein.”

“I played the drums, and I was in a band called Funkasaurus Rex in Toronto. When I left for school, it became hard to play as frequently.”

“The fact is, 'Billy Elliot' is an incredible show, for any age and any gender. 'Degrassi' fans would absolutely fall in love with 'Billy Elliot.'”

“I love singing, but I feel very naked and very vulnerable when I'm singing sometimes. With acting, I always think that it doesn't matter what you are as long as you're truthful in that moment. But with singing, you always have to hit the note. It's not like you can just go, 'Oh, it doesn't really matter what note you sing!'”

“I grew up reading comics. I was primarily an 'X-Men' fan, but I definitely dressed up as Spider-Man for Halloween when I was, like, 12 years old. Maybe younger than that.”

“I grew up in Canada and was a huge Spider-Man fan, and never thought of Spider-Man as an American hero.”