Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to DeAnté Bryant. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

DeAnté, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.

First off, I just want to say that without my parents (quite literally) there would be no me.

My Mom and Dad have been separated my entire life which is hard. I do believe with sincerity however that everything happens for a reason.

One thing that I believe my parents did right is that they both are able to admit that they are not perfect and have made mistakes in life. As human beings, that’s kind of what we do. We mess up, we say things that we wish we could take back, and we make choices that ultimately impact ourselves as well as the people that we love. A part of being an adult is learning to live with those choices and finding a way to move forward.

Ultimately I believe that my parents being separated actually gave me sort of a super power in a way, which is the ability to see things from two different sides, and the discipline to choose to remain objective.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

When it comes to my story, there’s a lot to unpack. So, for the sake of this interview, I’m going to try and keep things brief.
Let’s start with the basics: I’m 22 years old, I grew up in Springfield, MO, and I recently graduated as a first-generation student from the Sargent Conservatory at Webster University with a BFA in Musical Theatre (WOO HOO!)

Now when I was a kid, my dream was always to go to the NBA. Unfortunately for me, I was stuck with my 5 foot mother’s genes and currently stand at a respectable 5 feet 9 inches tall. So although my plans to go pro didn’t pan out, there was something else that started to grab my attention.

One of my earliest childhood memories is jamming out in the car singing along to Irreplaceable by Beyoncé with my mother and younger sister. At that time, I didn’t know what I was doing, but I did know that I loved doing it.

Flash forward to my third grade year, I was an absolute menace in the classroom, oftentimes finding myself in the principals office and even getting suspended from school. However, when my grandmother, who we were living with at the time, suddenly passed away in the middle of the school year, my family was devastated knowing that we had lost the glue that held us so tightly together. This loss changed me, but it was my music teacher Mr. Gutierrez who gave me hope again. He encouraged me to use his classroom as a safe space and ultimately it was music that got me through it. For the rest of my life, I knew that in my darkest moments when there were no words to express the pain that I felt, there was always a piano, waiting for me without any judgment or expectations.

So as my life went on, I learned to harness my class-clown energy and put it into my performance. I joined choir, show-choir, and eventually tried out for my first musical (Pippin) when I was a junior in Highschool. And the following year, after performing in my first lead role as Horton the Elephant in Suessical the Musical, I realized that performing was something that I loved and wanted to do for the rest of my life.

And THAT is where this ends because I told you I would keep things brief.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines resilience as “an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change”.

Earlier I brought up the passing of my grandmother and how it changed my life forever. Unfortunately this would not be the last time that I would deal with great loss in my life. During my Freshman year of college, in the midst of a world-wide pandemic, my older brother Caelan was shot and pronounced dead at the hospital, the bullet having pierced through his heart. He was 24 years old.

As you can imagine, it was extremely difficult for my family and I. Those who are close to me know that the day my big brother passed away, that version of DeAnté passed away with him.

But I did not let that break me. I started writing. First it was thoughts that didn’t make total sense, then it was chords that didn’t quite connect, but I kept on pushing. Pretty soon I had a play, with music, explaining my thoughts, feelings, and journey through faith titled ‘My Conscious Mind’. In the spring of 2022, my play was produced as a part of the Student Voices Project at the Sargent Conservatory of Theatre Arts. I went from feeling so isolated and alone, to being surrounded by a cast full of people who I knew loved me and were there to help me heal from what had been broken so deeply inside of me, for a moment.

On May 2nd, 2023, my younger brother Kiron tragically passed away at the age of 16, just days before my professional theatre debut in the ensemble of Eubie! at the Black Rep. The following week was my college graduation. Just one month later, on June 25th, my cousin Kayden was the victim of a drive-by shooting, in which he was completely unaffiliated. He was 23 years old. December 6th, 2023 was opening night for It’’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio play at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis in which I am playing Clarence the Angel—my first principal role at a major theatre company.

On one hand, I have suffered more loss than I can even comprehend, and on the other hand, I have been given more opportunities and blessings in my life than I believed I was ready for. But still, I keep moving forward.

Now, the dictionary did say that resilience is the ability to adjust EASILY, which I regret to inform you was not the case. Nothing about loss is easy, especially when it is someone as close to you as brother. But I CAN tell you that things do get easier overtime. The pain comes in waves. At first there’s a lot coming at you and it can seem overwhelming at times, but after a while you learn how to muster up the courage to try and stand up. And once you finally feel your feet under you you start to ride that wave, with the memory of that person you love living on each day like a beautiful, pink sunset, or perhaps the moon; out there, waiting for you with open arms.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

My mission is simple: To spread the word of God.

When I was a sophomore in college, I went to visit my family in Colorado (where I had lived for a few short, but very crucial years of my teenage life). After a few days, I realized that I had some past trauma that had not yet been healed, and triggers that I had not yet learned how to manage. One night, in a fit of rage, I jumped in my car and drove away, from our mountain home as fast as I could; desperately wanted to escape the feeling of losing control.

Suddenly, as I was soaring down the steep, mountain trail my car hydroplaned on in the dirt and I lost control of the wheel. Before I knew it, I was in the air, and with no time for a prayer, my car did a nosedive into the side of the mountain and flipped SIX times.

By the grace of God, I walked away from the scene with only a concussion and a heart-shaped scar (which reminds me of my Grandmother).

The next morning, when my family and I went to go clean up the wreckage, I bent down and picked up the first thing that I saw: a cross. But this wasn’t just any cross, it was a cross that belonged to my older brother Caelan. A cross that I swear to this day was not in my car.

A few days later, when the tow-man came to haul my car away, he broke down in tears. He pointed at me and said that I had been born again. He told me that God had given me another chance and that I should tell my story. I felt the Lord’s presence that day and swore to live my life for him. And I am proud to say that the summer before my senior year of college, I was baptized in the name of Jesus.

Since then, my life has been completely different. I am still far from perfect and make mistakes every single day, but what keeps me going is the love that God has for me and his promises of eternal life and salvation. My job is not to condemn others, but to help guide others towards the right direction: which is Him <3

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.deantebryant.com/
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/dangit_te?igshid=MmVlMjlkMTBhMg%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
• Youtube: https://youtu.be/CYnHylE-Gns?si=rObHbBMyDRVN_VYL
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5acI9X4dMl2nuMTHOq1ZvB?si=JnL1V1zgQs-K48fNCn-MIw

Image Credits
Phillip Hamer Jennifer A. Lin Jon Gitchoff Patrick Huber Jeannie Liautaud Kylee Vawter