Eleven-year-old Symonne Harrison embraces each new day, and all the moments in between, with the mantra, “It’s not ‘if,’ it’s ‘when.’”
It’s a forward-thinking saying for a fifth-grader, but as any Hollywood blockbuster will tell us, dreams can come true – no matter your age – if you stay dedicated, focused and work hard.
That’s exactly what Harrison, a former North Royalton Sweetheart and Little Miss North Royalton, is doing and where she could be headed. Already the inventor of the positive behavior tool “Bear on the Chair” that was recently featured on the hit comedy “Blackish” and the reigning Miss Pre-Teen Ohio for Pure International Pageants, Harrison is now working to make her mark in Hollywood.
“Every day, I see the Hollywood sign and the Walk of Fame, and I think to myself, ‘I’m doing it!’” Symonne said in a telephone interview from California. “Everyone is following their dream here. It’s so cool to see it. It inspires me. I have a motto that, ‘it’s not if, it’s when,’ like, it’s not ‘if’ I get that audition, it’s ‘when’ I get that audition, and like, it’s not ‘if’ I get to do that, it’s ‘when’ I get to do that.”
So how does a tween from North Royalton wind up in Tinseltown? It all started last year when Harrison was invited by her Ohio acting and modeling agent to audition for an opportunity to be one of 10 adolescents from Ohio and Illinois to travel to Hollywood and meet with agents, managers, an acting coach and Disney producer. The precocious Harrison naturally nailed it amongst hundreds of other hopefuls in both states and found herself on a plane to Hollywood. The event, called “LA Launch,” was truly a game-changer and put Harrison in touch with Chambers Stevens, an acting coach whose accolades include The Disney Channel, Nickelodeon and The Cartoon Network, among others. He immediately wanted to work with Symonne, but the Harrisons weren’t quite ready to take the plunge and decided to head home to North Royalton.
“He told us she had something really special, she had the ‘it’ factor, something nobody could teach her,” said Symonne’s mother, Tania. “We were brought to tears to a get a call from him months after the LA Launch, asking to work with her in L.A. We were completely stunned and so excited to get a phone call from Mr. Stevens that started exactly like this: ‘This is Chambers Stevens, I want to first apologize because I am about to change your lives.’”
Stevens stayed true to his word about changing the North Royalton family’s lives. After a lengthy family discussion, the Harrisons decided to make the move to Hollywood and bravely leave behind everything that was familiar. They now divide their time between North Royalton and Hollywood, where the family rents an apartment. Symonne was granted permission from her teachers at Saint Albert the Great School to be home-schooled by her mother.
After just one month of going on auditions, Symonne landed a leading role in a television pilot. A pilot is an episode of a TV series that is used to sell the show to a network. By contract, the Harrisons can’t divulge any details about the show, but the experience was enough to convince the family that they made the right decision.
“Just to get an audition is very difficult and to get casted is like winning the lottery. There are so many talented people all going after the same roles,” Tania said. “We are very grateful for this opportunity for Symonne to get this amazing start and begin building her resume. Symonne had the full red-carpet experience on set, complete with a hair and makeup artist, catered breakfast and lunch, on-set school teacher, lots of lights and cameras everywhere, and directors and producers running all around. After watching her on set and seeing how comfortable and in her element Symonne was, we know now more than ever, this is where she needs to be right now.”
Time will tell if Symonne’s pilot is picked up by a network, and in the meantime, she continues to go on auditions throughout the week. She also trains with choreographer Jabari Odom, at the renowned Millennium Dance Complex in Studio City. Odom has worked with Usher, Miley Cyrus, and Mariah Carey, just to name a few. In North Royalton, Symonne attended North Royalton Dance Academy.
She is also receiving voice-over instruction from Lynnanne Zager of Hotel Transylvania and Kung Fu Panda success and meets regularly with mentors Kimberly Crandall of “Fresh Off The Boat” and “Scandal” and Jae Head of “The Blind Side.” Another success came in the form of Symonne being featured in Art & Beauty magazine as one of the top 30 most up and coming beautiful models and community leaders from around the world. Symonne also recently appeared on an episode of The Price Is Right last month.
“We have been told by everyone in the industry that this will be a marathon, not a sprint, and you need perseverance, patience, tenacity, passion and thick-skin in this business,” Tania said. “Between acting, training, school work, maintaining over a 4.0 average, auditions, dance and any other opportunities that arise daily, Symonne’s days are very long but she loves and lives for every moment of it all.”
By SARA MACHO HILL
Contributing Writer