The cast of Australia's new High School Musical stage show say they're not trying to fill the shoes of the movie's stars Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens.
Chris Durling and Rebecca Tapia are just trying to make the characters of basketball captain Troy and science brain Gabriella come alive for fans around the country.
After hugely successful productions in the US and UK, Australia's own High School Musical (HSM) stage show will open in Sydney on December 14.
It will also travel to Adelaide, Canberra, Brisbane, Melbourne, Newcastle, Perth and Hobart in 2009.
Over 800 actors, singers and dancers answered the casting call, and Durling and Tapia and the rest of the cast were selected from 500 people who auditioned earlier this year.
Tapia bears a striking resemblance to Hudgens, and Durling is not unlike Efron.
But he said it was a relief to find out the creative team weren't looking for a Zac Efron clone.
"When you go into any audition you're asking yourself, what do they want?," Durling said.
"So obviously you're thinking, do they want Zac or don't they?
"It's so nice not to have to imitate somebody else's performance."
Associate director Coy Middlebrook said when casting the roles they were looking for actors who could convincingly inhabit those characters.
"You's trying to find the actors who have that initial essence of those characters and then we can build upon that," Middlebrook said.
"What we've been talking about these last few weeks at rehearsal is not try to take on the expectation of being Zac Efron or Vanessa Hudgens, but really just enjoying finding themselves in the characters of Troy and Gabriella."
Australia's production boasts the youngest ensemble cast of any HSM live show.
For many of the cast this is their first major production.
Tapia got her big break in Australian Idol in 2004 when she reached the semifinals, while Durling already has a following among young fans as an original member of Bindi Irwin's world famous Crocmen.
But neither of them have seen anything like the hysteria surrounding Disney's High School Musical franchise.
They were overwhelmed by the reaction of fans when Efron, Hudgens and co-star Ashley Tisdale attended the premiere of High School Musical 3 in Sydney last month.
"It was so exciting, and the fans were just insane - so loud," Tapia said.
"Chris went up to Zac and introduced himself, and I went up to Vanessa but we didn't get to chat or ask questions though."
Tapia said she would have asked the Hollywood stars what being a part of a the High School Musical phenomenon had been like for them.
It won't be long until Tapia, Durling and co find out for themselves.
