Broad Bay School pupil Jara Armstrong, 11, started ballet when he was 4 because his mother wanted to drop him and his four siblings to just one place.
His two older sisters had decided ballet, so ballet it was.
"Mum didn't want to bring everybody to different places for sports, so she was like ‘right, you're all doing the same thing’."
Now, Jara has been selected to play the role of Fritz, the lead child extra in Dunedin’s three shows of the Royal New Zealand Ballet’s The Nutcracker this weekend.
"I'm a bit nervous but I'm really excited," he said.
Jara, who attended Bennett School of Ballet and Jazz along with his siblings, said he always received a lot of great opportunities from it.
He auditioned for The Nutcracker about a month ago and was surprised to be picked.
His grandparents have bought eight tickets for the family to see him perform on Saturday night.
He was looking forward to performing in front of his whole family and had been practising most weekends leading up to the show with his ballet teacher.
At first he found the routine hard, but was feeling fairly confident ahead of the show.
