Effortlessly blending music, dance and drama, Dream: The Urban Musical makes for great entertainment. The new web series debuted last month and aired its second episode last night after Fox’s hit series, Empire.

The web series follows a group of aspiring artists as they navigate the drama of everyday life. The characters — largely played by creator Theshay West‘s art school friends — battle money problems and relationship drama in relatable, comical ways.

West says he drew inspiration for the quirky characters from his own friends, adding that, in some aspects, the storyline mirrors the lives of the cast members. He created the series in part so all of his ultra-talented friends could have a project to work on together. “We all found ourselves in the same situation where we were trying to make it and trying to get ourselves out there,” West says, “[The web series] incorporated the dancing, singing, acting and my filmmaking all together.”

Before creating Dream: The Urban Musical, West was shooting music videos for big names like Ludacris and Jermaine Dupri. West and his crew look to today’s biggest artists to inspire their own choreography. “When we’re preparing for shooting those scenes, we’re practicing and looking at videos,” West says, “The actors are basically being Beyoncé and all that in those musical sequences.” West also writes all of the music for the series, co-producing tracks with his younger brother. Though the undertaking makes series production more time-consuming, it certainly offers benefits, “Instead of finding a song to fit the story line, I can just create it.”

It took a grueling seven months to shoot the first six episodes of the series. “I think after it’s finished, thinking about the journey is when you get the most joy,” West says, “‘Cause when you’re doing it, sometimes it can become a little difficult. But then you finish and you’re like, ‘Yeah, we did that.’ And it doesn’t matter what we went through to get to that end goal.”

You can watch Dream: The Urban Musical here, and be sure to tune in to catch episode two!

What did you think of the trailer? Tell us in the comments below.

Dream: The Urban Musical

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