Dixie Newman: Musical Theatre, COVID Drawbacks, and Navigating Acting in London

Season 1 - episodes produced by Bloomsbury Institute.

Welcome to Take A Chance On You hosted by Alexandra Forsyth, cyber security expert, advisor, coach and public speaker. 

Today’s guests is Dixie Newman, actress, singer, dancer, performer and secret music producer. You may have seen Dixie in the not so secret Netflix hit show Bridgerton season 2!! 

Dixie was originally born in New York, and raised in Somerset, UK, where she discovered her love for acting, singing and dancing from a young age. Dixie went onto audition for the National Youth Choir and performed twice at the Royal Albert Hall in her mid teens, and in 2015, was accepted into Royal Central School of Speech & Drama to study a 3 year BA (Hons) in Acting, Musical Theatre where she spent 50 hours a week studying alongside a small class of 17 other students. 

Dixie faced a few setbacks along the way, including undergoing vocal surgery in her second year due to a cyst that was affecting her speaking and singing voice. The recovery time forced Dixie to learn how to speak and sing again which was stressful during a 50 hour a week intense course, however BIG achievements came later when Dixie did manage to still graduate with her original class. 

After graduating (and with a voice even better than before) Dixie went home to live with her parents during COVID and discovered a love of producing her own music, ranging from Pop, R&B and House - some of which are on Spotify. 

When Dixie moved back to London in 2021, she was offered a small role in season 2 of Bridgerton which was wonderful. Dixie learnt a lot in just the 5 days she was on set and realised that she wanted to move into doing more TV and Film as opposed to just theatre. Since then, Dixie has performed in a new comedy musical at the Southwark Playhouse (June 24) and hoping that more will come up!

Recommendations for listeners this week include, networking, using the people around you in the same position or who are finding the pro's in it a little better, and ask them to be your off camera scene partner when going through the process of self-tapes since COVID has changed the audition process.

The power of mentoring is also hot on the agenda for Dixie, after being burnt a little through agencies, she now finds solace in friends, and people around her. Researching prior projects, clients with agencies, and longevity to help find the right person to represent you in the acting world is crucial.

Follow along with Dixie on Instagram and Spotify