After the matinee performance of High School Musical, John F. Kennedy High School senior Zack Murphy competed in open auditions at Southwest Plaza Mall for the Moda Models and Talent Agency last spring. After several callbacks and months workshops, he and seven other Colorado residents headed to Orlando, Florida for the 26 th Annual AMTC or American Models & Talent Convention.

Since 1982, AMTC has invited promising Actors, Models, Singers, and Dancers to perform in front of the world's leading agents. Open auditions were conducted throughout the U.S, as well as Canada, Puerto Rico, England, Scotland, Australia and Kenya.

AMTC, created 25 years ago by New York Cover Girl, Millie Lewis, and daughter Carey Lewis Arban, is known as the top entertainment convention in the world. Contestants come to AMTC to find out if they have what it takes to work in major markets like New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago, Atlanta, Paris, Milan, London, or Tokyo and to learn first-hand how the entertainment business really works.

This year's participants performed for over 70 of the world's top agents, managers and casting directors. Years worth of auditions were condensed into six days. Zack competed with hundreds of other teen and adult men and women in Monologue, TV Commercials and Spokesperson, Cold Read, Scene Study, Improv, Singing, Standup Comedy, and Photography.

At the end of the competition, Zack was awarded honorable mention for TV Commercial and Improv, 3 rd place for Spokesperson and Cold Read, 2 nd place for Standup Comedy, 1 st place for Singing, and 1 st place for Overall Commercial Male. Zack hopes to join the hundreds of other recognizable AMTC success stories, who are movie, TV and Broadway stars, professional singers, and models with major agencies around the world.

Zack can be seen performing as Gaston in the upcoming JFK production of Beauty and the Beast on March 6 th - 8 th. Further information on the AMTC competition can be found at www.amtcworld.com.