EASTON, Pa — Ja’Siah Young is 11 years old and he can fly. He can jump into lakes, scale 80-foot trees, heal other people and render himself invisible.
Or, at least, his character can.
He plays Dion Warren, a young boy coming into his superpowers on the hit Netflix show “Raising Dion.” He and the show were nominated for six Children’s and Family Emmy Awards, which will be presented at an awards ceremony on Sunday, Dec. 11 in Los Angeles.
- Ja'Siah Young, of Easton, is the star of "Raising Dion"
- He was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Younger Performer in a Preschool, Children's or Young Teen Program
- He and the show were nominated for a total of six Emmys
“I started dancing out of nowhere, just terrible dancing,” said Ja’Siah, of Easton, about the moment he found out. “All my hard work paid off. This basically solidifies me as a professional actor now.”
In the show, his dad is Michael B. Jordan, of "Black Panther" fame. Jason Ritter of "Gravity Falls" plays his godfather. Rome Flynn of "How to Get Away with Murder" is his mentor. Ja'Siah also has 80,000 followers on Instagram.
Even though he’s young, he’s reached professional heights most grown-ups don’t.
Playing Dion
To get the role of Dion Warren, Ja’Siah went through four callbacks.
“When I realized I booked it, I was jumping with happiness,” he said. “The fact that I got to play a superhero, it’s just my dream."
“The fact that I got to play a superhero, it’s just my dream."Ja'Siah Young
The Spider-Man actors, in addition to Will Smith and Barack Obama, are Ja’Siah’s inspirations. He likes Tom Holland, but also “older Spider-Mans like Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield.
“They were the ones that inspired the superhero arc of my acting career,” Ja’Siah said. “When I actually booked this, I was like, let’s go!”
He was 6 years old during the first season and 9 years old during the second season, which was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The work he received the Emmy nomination for is from the second season.
“One thing about Ja’Siah is when he does fake crying, he’s really crying,” said Lawaine Young, his mom.
“Our cousin was murdered a few years back when he was about five, and he’s pretty close to him,” Lawaine said. “So he’ll think about that sometimes.”
He also imagines the loss of his baby sister.
“It causes a hard day,” Lawaine said. “It's not just because he's sad. It's what he has to think of to get there.”
Raising Ja’Siah
“Once he got into acting, he didn't want to do anything else,” Lawaine said.
College-educated with a master's degree, she picked up night shifts at warehouses so she could drive to New York at short notice for auditions.
“I call it a rich man's game, because it's hard to constantly travel,” she said. “What job can you have that you can constantly miss work?”
“I call it a rich man's game, because it's hard to constantly travel.”Lawaine Young
Trips to New York took 90 minutes each way. Auditions would be a couple of hours, but jobs could be up to eight hours.
“There were a lot of days where it was like, don't go to sleep, because you don't have time.”
By the time Ja’Siah was four, Lawaine had hit a wall.
“I’m like, I need to work better jobs,” she said. “I had to take a lot of jobs I shouldn't be doing with the MBA degree.”
But Ja’Siah wasn’t willing to give up on his dream, or even take a break from it.
“I'm like, you’re four. You don't even know what you want in life,” Lawaine said.
He told her, “If you take me out, I'll probably never get back in. You say you're gonna put me back in, but you won't.”
She told him that he didn’t even seem that dedicated, and it flipped a switch.
From then on, Ja’Siah became the one to remind his mom when they needed to rehearse for auditions. If there weren’t any, he would ask to work on his faces. “His sad face, mad face, and stuff like that,” she said. “That's when to started learning to cry on his own.”
The change in Ja’Siah led to a change of heart for Lawaine. He also started to audition for bigger roles. “Unfortunately, his agents believed in him initially, even more so than I did.”
What the future holds
For now, “I just want him to have the time of his life,” Lawaine said. “He's only 11. He knows exactly what he wants to do right now. But who knows?”
“He's only 11. He knows exactly what he wants to do right now. But who knows?”Lawaine Young
“It's so fun,” said Ja’Siah. “At the same time, you also have so many benefits for me and my family.”
His mom says he’s starting to grasp the seriousness of his Emmy nomination. He’ll say to his agent, “No matter what happens, I can quit acting today, and I'll still be nominated for an Emmy,” she said, quoting him. “My work was good enough to be nominated for an Emmy.”
He sees himself sticking with acting. But if it doesn’t work out, or stops being fun, he might become a doctor.
One thing he does know is, “I am going to go to college for sure," he said. "The college that I want to go to is Yale.”