By Valerie Milano

HOLLYWOOD, CA (Hollywood Today) 3/30/10 — Premiering March 27 on Nickelodeon in partnership with Sony Music was a new series, “Victorious”, created by the master of kid-television, Dan Schneider. Schneider is responsible for hits like “iCarly”, “Zoey 101”, “Josh and Drake” and “The Amanda Show’, to name just a few. What is his secret to success? Schneider said, “ What do I know? I think by sheer repetition of what I do, I’ve been doing this now so much. I used to be an actor on a TV show in the 80’s called “Head of the Class” and then after that I did another sitcom with Matthew Perry called “Home Free” that you don’t remember, but you can iMDb. I was going to do another sitcom… and as a lark, took this gig making “All That” for Nickelodeon, and then, you know, so much for the acting career. I’ve been her for 16 years doing this!”

The storyline is set around a group of students attending a performing arts high school, but it won’t be the new “Fame” or “Glee”. According to Schneider, “Well, we’re doing a major performance, I would say, probably every third or fourth episode. But in all of the episodes, we remind the audience that we’re a performing arts school, so there may be little bits and pieces in every episode, but there’s definitely episodes that aren’t about singing and dancing and then we have some that are, so we kind of want to give the audience balance. We don’t want to hit them over the head with the performing arts stuff and we kind of feel it makes the episodes more special if every fourth one you get the big performance.”

Victorious stars Victoria Justice basically grew up on Nickelodeon. She was part of the “Zoey 101” cast, a featured star in “Spectacular!” and the movie, “iCarly”, along with guest roles on many series.  The ensemble cast is a very talented group of teenagers, each with their own impressive resume.

Victoria Justice plays 16 year old Tori, invited to the Hollywood school but having lived in her sister Trina’s shadow so far, she is learning she may really be talented.  The series may be compared to “Fame”, but Justice said, “Yeah, I’ve seen “Fame”. I think it’s similar in the fact that the kids go to a performing arts high school. But the difference with “Victorious,” I think, is that these kids aren’t trying to be famous. The reason why they’re going to this school is because they love music and they just love singing and dancing and playing guitar and doing whatever. So their goal isn’t to become, like, the next Britney or anything. They just love what they do and cultivate that.”

Leon Thomas, who plays Tori’s BF, is from Brooklyn, and comes from a Broadway background. He is thrilled to be a part of this project, “ Broadway has always been special to me. I feel like the audience gives you that immediate reaction. But with this TV show “Victorious”, I’ve learned so many new things about comedy and timing, and it’s just really shaped me to be such a new artist, so I’m looking forward to doing more TV and movies and things like that, just because it’s given me something new.”

Schneider announced the possibility of a special project because of all of the young talent on Nick right now, “the other show I do is called “iCarly.” It stars Miranda Cosgrove, Jerry Trainor, Jenette McCurdy, Nathan Kress and that show’s a pretty crazy big hit right now. And so I’m actually going in productions back and forth right now between “iCarly” and “Victorious,” and we have talked about doing a crossover episode which, I think, our teenage, tween and kid fans would go crazy over. Both casts are very excited about that possibility, so now it’s just up to me to come up with something good.”

With Dan Schneider’s track record, we’re sure he will do All That!