So starting off the bat, I want to explain the title and everything in a summary before diving right in. I'm a now high school senior who, out of much effort and dedication, managed to start his own theatre company at the age of 16 with my first show being the rock musical, Spring Awakening. Very vague summary but I'll start getting into detail now. So, I had the idea when I was in my junior year of high school to start my own theatre company. While most teens my age would want to do it for the purpose of just putting on their favorite shows (which was only a very partial reason for my execution of it), I have always set forth the goal of making theatre accessible to anyone no matter who they are but also to present material that tells a lesson for the audience to take in their mind and to put on stories that extend the idea of making a change in society's standards. Recently, Deaf West theatre company revived the musical Spring Awakening with half the cast being Deaf or Hard of Hearing individuals and having almost all the blocking include American Sign Language. At the time, I had been learning ASL as I had always found such beauty in the language and wanted to learn it for myself. Once I saw just how impactful this show was on myself, a hearing individual, I couldn't help but imagine how much it impacts actors who just so happen to be Deaf or Hard of Hearing. With that, I set forth my goal to put on Spring Awakening for it's lessons that pull relevant today that I felt needed to be told to a current audience and to also implement ASL into the show, to help make theatre accessible as much as I could. With this, I produced, directed, and starred as Melchior in the show and had a team of amazing friends and family come together to help put together an amazing show that would later come to be posted in the local newspapers and websites. Just that alone left us all in such a euphoric state and we were so happy to be making such a huge difference in the community. One day, about a few days after we had closed, a cast member messaged me a link in huge excitement. The link redirected to an article about our work to put on Spring Awakening and my personal reasons for starting my theatre company, but the kicker was that it was for The Washington Times. I then found it even made it to the Chicago Tribune, which just made us even more excited to see our story stretching such boundaries. You think it would be over then, but there was one more surprise that hit me even bigger than all of the above combined. One actor I incredibly look up to happens to be the actor who played Melchior in the recent revival, Austin P McKenzie. Through ways I didn't fully understand how, he had sent me a handwritten letter through the mail explaining his thoughts on the character Melchior, and offered me wisdom for future times not just with my theatre company but with my overall life which helped me learn so much about myself tremendously. This production and this company have brought me so much knowledge and wisdom that I never would have gotten otherwise and I am so glad that I was able to do this show specifically. The power of Theatre is intense and to see how much it can affect an audience and society is truly mind blowing. I hope this was at least insightful for anyone who read, but I felt that I needed to tell my story to help anyone else or inspire anyone thinking about doing what they would think is the impossible. Thanks for reading, and support making the arts more accessible!