From the time she was young, senior Bailey Fronk has always known what direction she wants to steer her life toward: acting.
Growing up in Oregon and attending Cascade Heights Charter School for both elementary and middle school, Fronk’s love for the craft started young.
“Ever since I was a kid, I would watch shows and I’d be like, ‘That’s what I want to do,’” she said. “I used to practice accents in my bathroom, so it’s always been my dream.”
Though Fronk had always known the joy that acting brought her, the first time she truly started to consider it was in her fifth grade production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” where she played the role of Nick Bottom, which she considers the best performance she has ever done.
“I remember my mom coming up to me after, and she was like, ‘Wow, you’re really good at this,’ and that was when something clicked to me.” Fronk said. After that, she realized that she could use her talent to express herself and share a message to others, prompting her to highly consider acting.
At La Salle, Fronk’s passion for acting has only deepened, with her most enjoyable classes consistently revolving around the theater department. This year, she’s particularly excited about Directing and Management, though her all time favorite class would have to be the Intro to Theater Arts course that she took her freshman year.
“Any acting class at La Salle has been such a great experience for me because that’s what I want to pursue in the future,” Fronk said. “So seeing what that would look like through classes, I think that’s really cool.”
Fronk feels her most rewarding role thus far was in last year’s spring musical, Prometheus — a production never performed before at the high school level — where she played the role of Hermes. Since this was the first time that character had been performed, Fronk had the unique opportunity to shape it in her own way.
“It was super, super cool to kind of mold this character to who I am — incorporate some of my own style,” she said.
For Fronk, acting is more than just stepping into a role; it’s catharsis.
“Acting is the way I [feel] like I can portray my emotions through the character,” she said. “If I’m really angry that day, however my character feels, it’s enhanced, you know? Sometimes I feel like when I have the worst day, I act the best because I’m just getting it all out in this performance. I think that’s why I did a good job at Hermes, because I had all this anger I never expressed.”
“I feel like that emotion that’s stuck in me is able to come out in acting, and that’s such a precious art to me,” she said.
Fronk is represented by The Option Agency, which has helped her book auditions for commercials and short films. Although Option is mostly a modeling agency, her main passion has always been acting. While she auditioned for two agencies — Option and Stumptown Productions — she ended up choosing Option.
“I thought that would be a more mature agency to be part of because I wanted to do some serious acting,” she said. “I didn’t want to do little commercials here and there; I wanted to act.”
She’s enjoyed her time with Option, attending Christmas parties and getting occasional exciting opportunities, like a recent audition for a main character in a feature film. Though she can’t disclose too much, she’s thrilled to have been chosen from her entire agency to audition.
While Fronk had wanted to be repped for her acting as early as six, her mom encouraged her to wait. “My mom didn’t want me to until I was older because she wanted me to have a childhood,” she said, mentioning the horror stories of child actors.
“I think if I started earlier, I would have been more successful now, but I am thankful that I got to have that childhood without the pressures of being in an agency, auditions, etc.,” she said.
Balancing her agency work with school hasn’t been a challenge yet, partially due to what she calls the “dry age” between 12 and 17, where there are legal restrictions on what child actors can do on screen.
“I entered the agency right before the dry age, so I got a few things there, but it’s been pretty dry now,” she said. “It hasn’t been hard to balance because my main focus is schoolwork.”
Outside of theater, Fronk’s course load reflects her priorities, taking Anatomy & Physiology, AP U.S. Government, Statistics, English 4, Women’s Strength Conditioning, World Religions, and Directing and Management.
Fronk’s favorite class is Anatomy and Physiology, a subject that requires a lot of memorization — something she’s already good at thanks to her theater experience. Fronk is potentially interested in pursuing a career somewhere in the field of Anatomy & Physiology, so she is taking the class in order to either solidify or move on from her interest in that field.
Though she’s still undecided, Fronk dreams of going to college in California for its film scene and has narrowed her college search mainly to California State University. A school with a great acting program is a must, but she doesn’t want to limit herself to one field.
As a backup, Fronk is considering a career in the medical field, potentially as a doctor, surgeon, nurse, or even something in psychology. “Obviously, I want to be an actor — that would be my ultimate dream — but, maybe as a minor I would study to be a nurse, you know, something like that,” she said.
