Balancing Act

“Everything you see exists together in a delicate balance,” the wise leader Mufasa tells his son Simba in Disney’s “The Lion King.”

Mufasa is talking about the circle of life, but Broadway cast member Paige Fraser-Hoffman (MA ’24) has managed a delicate balance of her own for the past four years, performing eight shows a week while earning her master’s degree in arts and cultural management online from DU.

A Bronx native, Fraser-Hoffman had been dancing professionally for several years when she got the call for “The Lion King” in 2019. “It was surreal,” she says. “I woke up and saw a phone number I didn’t know. I listened to the voicemail and I just, like, fell to my knees. I had auditioned, I think, seven times.”

She chose the College of Professional Studies (formerly University College) over other programs offered through Disney’s Aspire program largely because of its focus on outreach. It was perfect for her, she says, because of her passion for community involvement and advocacy.

Fraser-Hoffman has long been interested in helping others through dance, traveling to Haiti and Jamaica to teach classes for at-risk youth for various nonprofits and schools. She, better than anyone, understands the importance of community support in overcoming challenges.

A diagnosis and becoming an advocate

At age 13, when Fraser-Hoffman was about to start her freshman year at a prestigious performing arts high school in New York, she was diagnosed with scoliosis. Because she was young and still growing, her parents opted to treat it with back bracing rather than surgery, which she did for months.

“It was awful. I wore a brace all day underneath my T-shirts and sweaters,” she says. “The only time I felt free was dance, because I got to take it off.”

The fact that she had already been dancing for several years and was aware of proper alignment and movement was a saving grace for her—as was the support of one of her dance teachers, who she learned also had scoliosis.

“Here was this person standing in the front of the room, with this career, with scoliosis. And I thought, if she can do it, I can do it,” Fraser-Hoffman says.

Her experience inspired her and her family to start the Paige Fraser Foundation in 2017, which offers free performing arts and wellness programs to people with physical and mental challenges in the Bronx and surrounding areas. Fraser-Hoffman serves as chief artistic officer and program director for dance.

Finding her rhythm

Fraser-Hoffman was thinking about the foundation and her future career in the arts when she chose the arts and cultural management program. “I can’t dance forever, and this seemed like a perfect mix of all the things I would need to sharpen my skills for what’s next,” she says. “It just felt right. And I’m a Sagittarius—if something feels right, I’m going to do it.”

She appreciated the asynchronous format and enjoyed her classes—especially event planning, social change leadership, and arts and culture entrepreneurship—but the program also challenged her.

In addition to learning skills and best practices on how to run a nonprofit and develop programming, she says, “I had been told I was a good writer, but this program took it to the next level. I learned how to better articulate myself, when to keep it brief and when to elaborate, and how to use research to support my ideas.”

While taking classes, Fraser-Hoffman was also serving as dance captain for “The Lion King” and as a “swing,” which means she had to learn multiple roles and step in when another cast member was unable to perform.

“I had to release my perfectionism,” she says. “It was a matter of finding a rhythm that worked for me and accepting that this is a lot of work. I took what I could out of it, didn’t beat myself up about what I couldn’t do, and always communicated with the professor if I needed help. That’s what kept me on a path.”

Today, she’s still in “The Lion King,” working for the Paige Fraser Foundation and teaching modern dance at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in Manhattan. She also recently directed a short film in partnership with a medical review journal, collaborating with dancers, including those with disabilities, and choreographing dance sequences inspired by poems about different illnesses over the years. She says she is thrilled to help bridge the gap between art and medicine and she looks forward to continuing that work.

“Getting my master’s degree strengthened my belief in dance and art as a tool and vehicle for change,” Fraser-Hoffman says. “Even though it took me four years, I’m so grateful that I committed to finishing it because I walked away with so much more than I had when I started.”