Kinley Cunningham

McKinley (Kinley) Rae Cunningham was born on December 22, 2010 in Los Angeles, CA. At the age of 2, her mother enrolled in a "Mommy and Me" dance class where it quickly became clear Kinley was a natural performer who loved being in front of an audience. For someone destined for the entertainment industry, her parents made the odd decision to move to Texas when she was 3. There she excelled in both gymnastics and dance, but at the age of 5, she started competing with a dance studio in Round Rock, TX, and her true talents began to blossom as she collected trophies and captured the attention of choreographers at various regional dance competitions and conventions. About this same time Kinley started training in acting and musical theater at her dance studio and started booking regional commercial and modeling jobs. Her parents could no longer ignore the fact that Kinley needed to be closer to the industry, so in May of 2019 her family moved back to the Los Angeles area. Kinley quickly began training with a well known dance studio in Orange County, signed with a talent agent, and started going on auditions. She earned a spot with Kid Clippers, the popular youth hip-hop crew that performs at LA Clipper home games, but had to turn the opportunity down due to her competitive dance commitments. Her first break came in the form of landing both a role in the chorus and of Shy Dwarf in the Lythgoe Family Panto theater production "A Snow White Christmas" produced and directed by Bonnie Lythgoe and starring Michelle Williams (Destiny's Child), Olivia Sanabia, Garret Clayton, and Neil Patrick Harris (pre-recorded). The experience cemented in Kinley the idea that she didn't want to just be a dancer, but that she wanted to also act and sing...perhaps even all three at the same time. Kinley quickly started to make a name for herself on the LA dance scene as well as the competition circuit, receiving her first two national titles in the Summer of 2020 at the age of 9. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, like everyone else Kinley started taking classes from home, and her parents started posting her combos on Instagram. They were prolific, posting a new dance nearly every day. Her high energy videos started to go viral, quickly growing an audience and catching the attention of Jessalynn Siwa who cast her as a dancer in Jojo Siwa's "D.R.E.A.M. The Slumber Party" music video. For Kinley, this was was a dream come true.