page_title: Corbin Bleu
section_title: 1996–2005: Early career
hierarchical_section_title: Corbin Bleu / Acting career / 1996–2005: Early career
caption_attribution_description: English: Actor from High School Musical Corbin Bleu in January 2006.
context_page_description: Corbin Bleu Reivers, known professionally as Corbin Bleu, is an American actor, model, dancer, film producer and singer-songwriter. He performed in the High School Musical film series. Songs from the films also charted worldwide, with the song "I Don't Dance" peaking inside the Top 70 of the Billboard Hot 100. During this time, he also starred in the Disney Channel Original Movie Jump In!. His first lead role was in the film Catch That Kid. He has since appeared in the Discovery Kids drama series Flight 29 Down, as well as the film To Write Love on Her Arms. He competed in the 17th season of Dancing with the Stars, partnered with professional dancer Karina Smirnoff.
  He has also pursued a music career, and released his debut album Another Side on May 1, 2007, which included the single "Push It to the Limit". The album debuted at number thirty-six on the U.S. Billboard 200, selling 18,000 copies in its first week. Bleu released his second album, Speed of Light, on March 10, 2009. He returned to television, starring in the short-lived Ashton Kutcher–produced CW series, The Beautiful Life: TBL, and the movie Free Style.
context_section_description: Bleu moved with his family from New York to Los Angeles in 1996. He worked steadily in episodic television and feature film roles, including a recurring role on the short-lived ABC police drama High Incident and a guest star appearance on ER. He also appeared in some films, like Beach Movie (1998), and the sci-fi thriller Soldier (1998). His feature films from this period include the Tim Allen comedy Galaxy Quest (1999), and the comedy Mystery Men (1999), which starred Ben Stiller, and the drama Family Tree (1999), alongside Andrew Lawrence and Matthew Lawrence. Bleu also had roles in Malcolm & Eddie, as Matthew, and Cover Me: Based on the True Life of an FBI Family (2000), as Nick Elderby and smaller roles like in the comedy series Nickelodeon's show The Amanda Show.
  Additionally, Bleu was developing his dance skills and in 2001 began intensive training at the Debbie Allen Dance Academy in the Los Angeles area. There he undertook a full gamut of dance instruction, including ballet, jazz, tap, modern, hip-hop, African, break dance, salsa, flamenco, and ballroom. Allen, the famous choreographer who starred in the TV series Fame, told Dance Spirit magazine, "I think [Bleu] really has a career. Success is one thing, but a career is a much longer, broader journey".
  Bleu attended the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts, a magnet school like the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, which was portrayed in the movie and television series Fame, and which Bleu's mother had attended. During his freshman year, he won his first sizable film role in the teen action caper Catch That Kid (2004), about a girl and her friends who decide to rob a bank after learning that money is needed to aid her dying father, alongside Kristen Stewart and Max Thieriot. Although it was a box office flop, having only grossed $10 million, it served as an important step for Bleu, who was still building his acting career at the time. During high school, he performed in such student productions as Footloose and Grease, winning the honor of Theatre Student of the Year.
  In the summer of 2004 Bleu landed a starring role in the television series Flight 29 Down, alongside Allen Alvarado, Hallee Hirsh, Lauren Storm, Jeremy James Kissner, Johnny Pacar and Kristy Wu, which aired for three seasons on the Discovery Kids network. The program, a juvenile version of the ABC series Lost, concerned a group of teenagers stranded on a tropical island after their plane crashes. Bleu played as Nathan McHugh, a Boy Scout whose leadership skills do not quite measure up to his self-confidence.
caption: Bleu in January 2006
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