Tom Marchant's sister was supposed to be the theatre star.
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His mum Kylie McDonald put her daughter into drama classes - but she was too nervous to enter the studio.
"Tom took her by the hand and he said 'come on Belle, I'll do it with you'," Ms McDonald said.
"Anyway, he stuck with it. She did not."
Now, the 16-year-old Girton Grammar student is ready to take on a new role - one of four recipients of the prestigious John Bell Scholarship for 2024.
The scholarship grants young actors a week at the Sydney-based Bell Shakespeare theatre company.
"You learn all the bells and whistles and do workshops with them," Tom said.
"And we get to sit in on some rehearsals for their upcoming A Midsummer Night's Dream production."
'Seemed like a lot of jumbled words'
Shakespeare was a bit of a different beast for Tom, who said he only read his first Shakespearean lines in the school's 2020 production of Macbeth.
"I was a little overwhelmed ... [the script] just seemed like a lot of jumbled words," he said.
"But I think I carried my weight pretty well."
It was not until he landed a larger role in the school's 2023 production of Romeo and Juliet that he began to realise how Shakespeare had managed to stay relevant so long.
"There is just an endless amount of diving you can do ... and there's just so much you can look at," Tom said.
"What I love about it is how it's all still so relevant in today's world."
Tom said he appreciated how Romeo and Juliet reflected the trials of modern teenage love.
"That made me kind of fall in love with [Shakespeare]."
Building theatre connections
Learning lines was something that came natural to Tom, who said he did not have any quirky techniques - just that his line reading had to be physical.
"I can not be sitting there and just read ... I have got to get up and walk around with my script."
Ms McDonald said she was Tom's usual line reading partner, and mouthed along with the actor's when she saw her son's performances.
Tom said he looked forward to meeting John Bell, and performing the monologue that earnt him the scholarship - Romeo's balcony speech where he estranges himself from the Capulets - to the Australian theatre pioneer.
"My main thing is really building connections and just having that for the future," Tom said.
He leaves for Sydney, to complete his secondment at Bell Shakespeare, on Friday, January 26.
