DURYEA — Gia Innamorati always dreamed of being an actress or a model.
This summer, her dreams are a little closer to becoming reality.
The 12-year-old Duryea native spent a week in Orlando, Florida from July 12 to July 19 to participate in an audition process for Disney called “Premiere.”
According to the event’s website, “Premiere” was established in 2009 and is designed to showcase actors, dancers, singers and models between the ages of 5 to 18 before industry professionals who specialize in launching young performers. “Premiere” has hosted these functions over a dozen times since 2010, which are held at the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort.
The entire process for the Pittston Area Middle School student began on Dec. 6, 2014 when she first auditioned in New York City. The next day, she was called back for a second evaluation and became one of 600 participants out of 7,200 auditions overall to take part in the “Premiere” event in July.
Despite the long wait between her New York City and Orlando auditions, Gia said it was worth it.
“It was good that we had six months or else I wouldn’t have been able to do it,” she said. “It was a lot of things to remember.”
During that time in between, Gia spent time working on her dancing, as she is a member of the Julie Ardito School of Dance in Old Forge, and also her acting thanks to her acting coach Dru West, with whom she chats over the Internet via FaceTime, as he lives in Arizona.
Throughout the course of the week in Orlando, Gia participated in various acting, modeling and dancing routines in front of a panel of judges.
“She had five model scenes she had to do by walking a runway,” said Gia’s mom, Chartan Innamorati. “She also had to do six speaking auditions. She had a very busy week because they had to change outfits because it was modeling, then acting, then modeling, then acting and then dancing.”
The modeling portion was easy for Gia, but said she had some difficulty in the acting segment.
“You had to memorize six things and it was hard to speak out with them,” she said.
When it comes to acting, Gia is not one to portray a background character, saying she has performed lead roles for soap operas, a sitcom, a Best Buy commercial, a beauty commercial and a one-liner.
She also performed three monologues — two dramatic, one comedic.
Gia also got the chance to meet Disney stars such as Trinitee Stokes, from “K.C. Undercover,” Piper Curda from “I Didn’t Do It” and “Teen Beach 2,” Calum Worthy from “Austin and Ally,” and Rowan Blanchard from “Girl Meets World,” all of whom spoke with the young performers about life as an actor.
When the auditions were all said and done, Gia said she got call backs from various agents in New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles.
Chartan said does not know her daughter will begin working her dream job.
“It’s a waiting game to wait and see what they want to do with her,” said Chartan. “It could be now, it could be in a couple of months. Each one wanted to see her with her braces off, but she gets them off at the end of the month, so it may move faster than we think.”
Gia is looking forward to the exciting opportunities that lie ahead.
“It makes me feel excited,” she said. “I’m very happy to be part of it and I like doing acting and modeling because I’ve always wanted to be an actress since I was little. It was a good experience for me.”
Chartan said she is thrilled to see her daughter’s hopes and dreams come true.
“We always told her, ‘Live life the way you want to live it,’” she said. “This is her dream, so hopefully her dream comes true.”