Vinson's TV vision

[Andy]

Vinson's TV vision

Sunday Herald Sun

16 April 2006

Sharni Vinson has trained her whole life to be an actor.

"I have grown up in a musical theatre-orientated family so from a young age I was dragged to rehearsals with my mum," Vinson, 22, says. "But I really wanted to do musical theatre."

She plays Cassie Turner in Home And Away and has trained in dance, singing and acting.

"I always kept my options opened and I would have been happy to see any of those go ahead."

In 2001, it was her singing career that looked set to skyrocket.

Vinson was signed to a record label and she brought out two singles, but she says it fell through because she was not managed well.

"When that happened, I went right into dancing," she says.

In 2004, Vinson won a role in the musical Grease, but two weeks later she auditioned for Home and Away and got the part.

"It was really just luck," she says. "I thought my life was heading in one direction and then, all of a sudden, it is another and then you go that way.

"I was prepared to do any of the three. Ultimately, I made the right decision to do Home And Away."

An only child raised by her single mother and much-loved grandparents, Vinson said her mother was on "cloud nine" when she won the role of Cassie.

"She is really proud," Vinson says.

Vinson was especially close to her grandparents.

"When I was little, mum was still working, doing musicals, doing cruise ships and I was often with nanna and making tapes to send to her overseas."

Her grandmother, once a professional ballerina, has since died and Vinson lives with her grandfather, Noel.