How do you choose between the two great passions in your life? Dr Shewit Belay is figuring it out as she balances being a doctor and musical theatre performer.
By Ara Jansen
If Dr Shewit Belay had a motto, it might be to grab opportunities with both hands while keeping a calm and steady grip.
After graduating with a medical degree from James Cook University, Shewit worked in Townsville, Mackay and the Torres Strait before spending 2021 as a junior doctor at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital.
She is still working towards a Master of Public Health and Tropical Medicine and a research project on female genital mutilation.
In 2022 the Eritrean Australian also made her debut in the Melbourne season of the musical Hamilton and later played Nessarose in Wicked the Musical. Now she’s a stand-by for at least two characters in the award-winning MJ The Musical, which opens in Perth on June 7.
MJ the Musical isn’t biographical but centres around the making of Michael Jackson’s 1992 Dangerous World Tour, offering a rare look at the creative mind and collaborative spirit that catapulted Jackson to legendary status.
MTV journalist Rachel and her cameraman are invited to document the rehearsal process. Through her interviews we see flashbacks to Jackson’s childhood and into his imagination. The theatrical rock concert features more than 25 Jackson hits and to date has been seen by more than six million people globally.
Shewit juggles a busy schedule of being a stand-in (which requires rigorous preparation and stepping in at a moment’s notice), a blocking captain (which helps maintain the show’s staging and movement integrity) and being a doctor. During time off and holidays from the show, she picks up local locum work.
“Recently I just finished a two-week stint doing locum work and then went back to the show,” says Shewit. “It’s a lot of work and very challenging but I have really been enjoying it.
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“As blocking captain, it has been fun to explore what leadership in a show feels like. MJ is also technically challenging so it’s an incredible learning experience. Plus, musical theatre does tend to dominate your life as it’s a six day a week world.”
The doctor has had a life-long love of music, singing and being on stage. She sang in church and appeared in her first musical at 10. Through school she balanced the sciences with art with her greatest interest being working in medical and aid organisations, particularly in women’s health and infectious diseases.
Now she manages the physicality of working on stage and constantly being in a heightened state of readiness with the demands of being a doctor. She says steadiness and consistency transfers between both. Creating a psychological calm in either environment comes from merging her medical training with artistic intuition.
“Some weeks I can be on stage for six shows and other weeks, it’s just a matinee. There’s so much variation it’s hard to predict and I like the unpredictability of it.”
Yes, at some point she knows she is probably going to have to choose.
“For the last four years I have been doing both musicals and working as a doctor. It feels like a crossroads and sometimes I really feel like I have to make a decision.
“I’m blessed things have worked well and there’s been enough work with both. But I’m getting to a point where my priorities are shifting and I know it’s not a sustainable way to live. Over the next six months I am going to try and figure out what my next stage looks like.
“I have toyed with walking away from clinical medicine but it’s such a hard decision. Burnout is real and you often don’t realise it until it’s really bad.”
How to honour her artist and her clinician will continue to be a question for Shewit. In the meantime, the singer-songwriter is also creating her own music as Shewita. Too Soon, her smooth debut single came out in March.
MJ The Musical is at Crown Theatre from June 7-28.
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