Rising Stars: Meet Doug Penikas

Today we’d like to introduce you to Doug Penikas.

Hi Doug, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I started dancing when I was twelve years old. I was in middle school and chickened out at the first school dance when the girl I had a crush on asked me to dance with her. I didn’t know how at the time. The next day I was in a dance class at Dance Precisions, learning how to walk across the floor to a beat in my first hip-hop class. Later that year, when I performed on stage, I knew dancing was going to get me where I wanted to be in the entertainment industry. I had always been fascinated with acting, movies, and storytelling through performance. Dancing was my way in. I got my agent when I was a senior in high school and started working professionally when I turned eighteen. I’ve been fortunate to work on truly amazing jobs and have loved every second of it. Especially the film and TV ones.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I can’t say that the road has been smooth. That’s mainly because of the type of gig that was holding auditions and what the job was seeking. When I first started, I was auditioning constantly, sometimes five days a week. Auditions could take all day depending on what it was and how many hundreds of people were there all vying for one of five available spots. It’s changed a lot now with self-tapes, which is much nicer on my gas tank, but I do miss the in-person auditions. Especially for acting. The biggest challenge has been mental. Sometimes I’ve had to remind myself why I chose this path, especially with the amount of rejection any performer deals with when auditioning. When I am lucky enough to book a gig, it makes everything worth it. My best friend told me the industry isn’t going anywhere. There will always be another audition. So go!

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I’m an actor, dancer, writer, director, and producer. That way, I never get bored.

I love performing and being in front of the camera. Started in the industry as a professional dancer working in movies such as Disney Channel’s High School Musical 2, High School Musical 3: Senior Year, Glee seasons 1 and 2, Netflix’s The Prom, Showtime’s Penny Dreadful: City of Angels and a bunch of other great tv shows. I studied filmmaking in high school and college, but the best education has been from being on sets, doing short films for friends and myself. I even wrote, acted, directed and produced my own feature Blood Type: Unknown when I was twenty-three. That’s when I dove in the deep end and started to learn a lot about how the film business works. Recently I’ve been getting into more musical theatre, performing in West Side Story twice, playing Action, and In The Heights playing Graffiti Pete.

I’m most proud of being part of the High School Musical film franchise. That was a truly magical time that still means so much to so many people around the world. It makes me happy when I meet a fellow Wildcat and see the joy of their childhood return in their eyes.

I don’t know if this sets me apart from others because I know plenty of actors, dancers, writers, and directors that dabble in all those fields to keep the creative juices flowing, but aside from screenplay writing, I am also a novelist and have two books currently published that I co-wrote with my aunt. Lost Treasures: Secrets of the Royal Danish Egg and Lost Treasures: Secrets of the Totenkopf Rings. They’re basically young female Indiana Jones meets Mission Impossible action adventure stories. We’re going to be writing the third adventure later this year. It’s gonna be exciting!

Any big plans?
My plans for the immediate future are to write the third novel in Lost Treasures Series. I’m also producing/directing an original dance movie that I’ve written. We have to fix some of the original music for that before we go into official pre-production and cast the remaining roles. So I will be juggling those projects while auditioning for the next gig that comes my way. The book and the movie are going to take up most of my time for the foreseeable future. I’m very excited, especially to get both of those projects completed.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.dougpenikas.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dougpenikas/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dougpenikas
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/dougpenikas
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRc4tvmza3kiJFUvOnNCTeA

Image Credits
Jeff Xander, Vacht Kara, Alexa Lampe, Samara Otero.