Music is always inside actor and dancer Danny Burgos.

"I grew up always singing in church every Saturday and everyone always told me how beautiful I sounded and all that stuff," Burgos said. "But I always wanted to go into medicine. Every since I was little I wanted to be a doctor, I really wanted to do nursing or something like that. So, I did my first two years [of College] at Florida State University as a nursing student."

That was until one anatomy class changed the course of his life. 

"I realized just how hard it was, nothing was really sticking into me, so I decided that I should try to go with my passion. And so I auditioned for the Musical Theatre Program," Burgos said.

Just a few years after that revelation, Burgos is part of the Broadway national tour for “Beauty and the Beast,” which will play at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts Feb. 16-21.

After graduating with a bachelor’s in musical theater from Florida State, he took part in several regional tours where he had the chance to play some dream roles, like Bernardo in “West Side Story” and Gomez Adams at “The Adams Family.”

“Beauty and the Beast” is his first national tour, and one of his most exciting theatrical opportunities to date.

“It’s my first time really seeing the country and I always said that what I wanted to do when I first get out of college was to travel, so it’s very fortunate to be able to travel doing something that I went to school for and something that I love. I was really excited because this is exactly what I’ve been working towards for my four years at school and it was just very exciting to finally achieve what I’ve been working so hard towards.”

Burgos is part of the ensemble and also plays the role of Monsieur D’Arque, the head of the asylum where Belle’s father is threatened to be taken.

“In the second act I play the bad guy and it’s a lot of fun. I was told in rehearsal that I’m allowed to just have fun with the character and just have a good time with him.”

How does an actor prepare for a character like this one?

“In the first act I’m in the assemble so I play a bunch of different characters and so during intermission I get ready for my second act character and I do my make up in 20 minutes. Then I go and I get my costume on and my wig on. I’d said that in a matter of 35 minutes I’m ready to go on stage and I take that time to figured out what I’m going to do because he is an older character, so I have to figured out the stands, how I’m  going to talk or walk.”

As of the performance, Burgos said it has a really good staging and it’s a musical created for all ages, not only for those who grown up with the movie.

“What I always said is that I didn’t even know what I was getting into when I first got hired for this job because I have never seen ‘Beauty and the Beast’ on stage. I’ve only ever seen the movie. I think our production does a really great job of taking everything that people love from the movie that they grew up with and we add even more spectacle to it. So we take something that was really good and we make it even better and there is nothing quite like watching this things coming to life in front of you.”

When we asked him about the current state of Latino artist in the U.S., Burgos, who was born in Florida from a Cuban mother and a Puerto Rican father, shares his optimism.

“I personally believe that it’s a wonderful to be Latino in Hollywood and New York right now. Because we have Eva Longoria, America Ferrera, Alejandro González Iñárritu… I think it’s fantastic that so many actors and directors of color are being recognized for their work. On Broadway right now we have ‘On your feet’, which is the story of Gloria Estefan and we have Lin-Manuel Miranda, who wrote the musical ‘Hamilton’, which is taking Broadway by storm. It makes me very happy because it has always been that there are so little minorities represented in the arts.”
His main advice for all this young actors who want to pursue a career in this field is “to keep learning. Never feel like you are done learning."

“I mean, I’m here on a national tour of a Broadway show and there is still so much more for me to learn. I can be a better singer, I can be a better dancer and I can be a better actor, up until the day I die. So my biggest advice to them will be just to never stop getting better."

To buy tickets for the performance visit www.beautyandthebeastontour.com.