Young performer realizing a dream

By Jerry Fink

Friday, Aug. 14, 2009 | 2 a.m.

Spring Mountain Ranch State Park isn’t Broadway, but it may be on the route for aspiring entertainer Primrose Martin.

Martin, a 16-year-old theater major at the Las Vegas Academy, plays the park’s outdoor stage in “Once on This Island,” the third musical in the Super Summer Theatre lineup. The group ends its season in September with “Working,” based on the Studs Terkel book.

This is the first legitimate stage appearance for the precocious performer who has been singing and dancing since age 5. She will get credit at the Academy for her summer experience.

“I’ve been dreaming of this since I was 9,” she says.

Her talent comes naturally. Her father is Skip Martin, the Grammy-winning trumpeter who once was the lead singer for Kool & the Gang. Her mother, Dorothy, is a teacher at Cheyenne High School and has written dozens of pop and R&B songs.

“She isn’t into nepotism and doesn’t want to be known as Skip Martin’s daughter,” says Dorothy Martin. “She wants to be known for herself.”

Primrose, “Rosie” to friends and family, has a lengthy resume that includes a movie (“Heroes”), a commercial (“100 Voices,” a public service announcement being shown in Times Square in New York City) and several amateur theatrical productions (“Cats,” “Shakespeare in the Park”).

“Once on This Island” was written by Lynn Ahrens (lyrics and book) and Stephen Flaherty (music). It had more than 400 performances on Broadway in 1990 and ’91. The story is based on the novel “My Love, My Love” by Rosa Guy. The musical is a retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid” set in the French Antilles in the Caribbean Sea.

“It’s an amazing experience,” says Primrose, who plays the role of Toka. “It beats anything else I’ve ever done. At school I always focused on grades, but now I know for sure this is definitely what I want to do — to perform. I want to keep doing this.”

Primrose graduates next year, and her mom says she is considering studying music at Berklee, drama at Yale or psychology at Georgetown.

“Right now school is the most important thing in her life,” Dorothy says. “She has to balance academics with all of her other activities.”

Outside of school and theater, Primrose is an ambassador for the Juvenile Diabetes Association (she has Type I diabetes) and a member of the National Honor Society.

She says she was a little nervous when she first took the stage at Spring Mountain Ranch.

“But they were good butterflies,” Primrose says. “So many people I knew came to the first show and I didn’t want to let anyone down.”