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Courtesy photo<\/p>\nA suite of emotions swept over Paulina Reyes: awe, disbelief, gratitude.<\/p>\n
She had just ended a Zoom call with director Ross Boothe, who had asked her to join the cast of his upcoming independent feature film \u201cBrotherhood: A Cinematic Musical.\u201d The movie centers around two next-door neighbors and their families: Jon, a white U.S. citizen, and Fabi\u00e1n, a Mexican immigrant who has applied for asylum.<\/p>\n
Reyes has been a background actor in feature films and has served as the lead in short films, but this is the first time that Reyes, a 21-year-old musical theater senior at Northeastern University \u2013 New York City, will play one of the leads in a feature film. It premieres in New York on Thursday, Oct. 1 and opens in select theaters on Oct. 9.<\/p>\n
Without her education and the connections she\u2019s made over the past three years, \u201cnone of this would have been possible,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t think I would have felt as prepared.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Reyes first read the Instagram casting call notice that her mother sent her, she instantly knew she would be right for the role.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh my God, that\u2019s me,\u201d the young Latina recalled blurting out. She is Mexican-American and was struck by how much she had in common with the character of Fabi\u00e1n\u2019s daughter, Sofia.<\/p>\n
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\nStudent Paulina Reyes plays Sofia in a new independent feature film \u201cBrotherhood: A Cinematic Musical.\u201d Courtesy photos<\/p>\n
Reyes\u2019s mother emigrated from Monterrey when she was 15 and her father grew up living between the border cities of Matamoros, Mexico and Brownsville, Texas. Growing up in a household in San Antonio, Texas, where Mexican and American cultures combine, she\u2019s familiar with the practice of \u201ccode switching\u201d \u2013 changing language and behavior to fit in with a particular group.<\/p>\n
Reyes mused how when with friends, the character Sofia feels like she\u2019s \u201ctoo Mexican\u201d and when she\u2019s at home \u201ctoo American.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe feels like she\u2019s never one thing,\u201d Reyes said. \u201cI can definitely relate to that my whole life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Two weeks after she was hired for the role in the middle of her 2026 spring semester, Reyes boarded a plane to Salt Lake City, Utah. The filming took place over five weeks. That experience, which melded her love of musical theater with her affinity for film, changed her perspective, she said.<\/p>\n
From a young age, Reyes had had a \u201cNew York or nowhere\u201d attitude. Today, she\u2019s keen to widen her horizons, accepting opportunities wherever they might arise \u2013 whether that\u2019s the burgeoning film scene in Austin, Texas or the open seas as a cruise ship performer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t feel like I have to stay in one place. I want to see where it goes. I want to keep auditioning and do it all,\u201d said Reyes, who as a youngster loved the Disney Channel TV show \u201cHannah Montana\u201d and the movie series \u201cHigh School Musical,\u201d and would take any opportunity to burst into song, act in school plays or perform community theater.<\/p>\n
Her mother, Tatiana Csitkovits, said she was filled with pride watching her daughter chase a dream that Csitkovits once had for herself.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re very happy with how much she\u2019s learned. There\u2019s always an opportunity for you to keep on getting better and better and better,\u201d the mother said. \u201cEvery time that she comes home or we get to see her (in New York) on a show or something, we see how much she\u2019s grown as an actress, as a singer, as a dancer.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\nPaulina Reyes has had a range of experience on the stage during her time as a musical theater student. Courtesy photos<\/p>\n
Reyes has used her classes to hone her craft, learning everything from finding a suitable audition song to how to develop a character from scratch.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When practicing to become the character Sofia, she incorporated her own experiences in addition to those of her mother and aunt, the latter who immigrated to the U.S. at age five.<\/p>\n
Through this character, she said she wanted to honor and truthfully depict the immigrant experience.<\/p>\n
In a class called \u201cScene into Song,\u201d taught by then-assistant professor Michael Mendez, Reyes and her classmates learned about how to connect spoken dialogue with song, and worked to understand characters, their relationships and their motives.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that class set her up for this movie because she spent so much time going through scene work and music,\u201d Mendez said. \u201cAnd now she got to do it at the highest level.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He said getting to have this professional experience and then come back to school to learn more presented an enormous opportunity to grow. And he offered Reyes some advice before her audition.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBe yourself and trust in yourself,\u201d he told her. \u201cIt\u2019s your job to take this character and make it your own.\u201d<\/p>\n