Lisa Maietta Rybacki, a 28-year-old dancer who grew up in Country Club, has opened a full-scale dance and acting studio that will develop the talents of neighborhood young people.
Rybacki is opening the dance studio after ending her time as dance captain for the First National Broadway Revival Tour of Grease. She appeared in numerous regional productions of Broadway shows. She opened Dream Makers Performing Arts at 3432-10 Bruckner Boulevard on Monday, October 12.
The studio offers dance, acting and voice classes from instructors who are professional dancers and singers from Broadway, music videos, and ballet companies. Genres are as broad as jazz, tap, musical theater, ballet, pointe, and contemporary dance, and much more.
“It is a full performing-arts academy where you have your choice of dance, acting, and voice,” Rybacki stated. “It is like your one stop shop for the performing arts. I never had a place like that growing up in the neighborhood. I always had to travel for my training. Now, I want to bring it back home.”
Rybacki started dancing at the age of four, and trained at various dance studios around the metropolitan area.
While attending Preston High School, Rybacki realized that dance was more than something that she was passionate about, but would also be her career path.
“I won several national titles – including Miss Headliner, Rising Star, On Stage America – then when I was 16-years-old I won a scholarship to Steps on Broadway, which is one of the country’s most prestigious dance schools,” Rybacki said. “When I graduated from high school, I joined actor’s equity and won a role in my first major production – My One and Only: A Tommy Tone Musical.”
From that point on, Rybacki performed extensively throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe.
She danced and acted in the European Tour of Grease as Frency, where she performed dialogue in foreign languages. She has played in regional productions of Broadway plays such as Anything Goes, Thoroughly Modern Millie, 42nd Street, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, West Side Story, Singing in the Rain, My One and Only, The Music Man, and Oklahoma. She has also performed in music videos, theme parks, and documentaries.
“The more challenging the dancing, the better,” Rybacki said. “West Side Story and 42nd Street are some of my favorite shows because they have the most dancing and the dances are sharp and clean.”
Rybacki added: “I am willing to teach anyone who is willing to work hard.”
For more information on Dream Makers Performing Arts, call (917) 714-7623.
