A classroom of 19th-century German schoolboys rocks out in the Tony Award-winning musical Spring Awakening. (Paul Kolnik/Mirvish Productions)

When Canadian Idol finalist Steffi D wowed viewers back in 2006 with her spunky performance of David Bowie's grandiose hit Life on Mars?, judge Zack Werner dubbed her a "one-woman rock opera spectacular." It was a prophetic pronouncement. She may not have captured the Idol crown, but the quirky singer from Orléans, Ont., has since landed a starring role in the coolest rock opera since Rent.

'I'm just so proud to be telling this story. It's so powerful and strong and gutsy and beautiful. Spring Awakening is this once-in-a-generation thing; it's our generation's Rent.'

-- Steffi D

Steffi D is now belting out ballads of teen angst in Spring Awakening, the Tony Award-winning Broadway hit, which has just bounded into Toronto's Canon Theatre for a month-long run. It's the 14th stop – and the only Canadian one – on the show's 21-city North American tour.

Her Idol fans will be happy to know that their drama queen has lost none of her infectious energy, which fits perfectly with the musical, a hormonally charged retelling of Frank Wedekind's fin-de-siècle drama about the perils of puberty.

"I'm just so proud to be telling this story," bubbles Steffi (full name DiDomenicantonio), who will turn 20 in April. "It's so powerful and strong and gutsy and beautiful. Spring Awakening is this once-in-a-generation thing; it's our generation's Rent."

But if Rent rewrote La Bohème for the age of AIDS, Spring Awakening sticks closely to its classic origins. Wedekind's still daring play – written in 1891, but banned until 1912 – is a milestone in its sympathetic portrayal of budding sexuality. Set among a group of German school kids, its compendium of once taboo adolescent issues would make even Judy Blume's head spin. They include wet dreams, masturbation, date rape, teen pregnancy and abortion, bi-curiosity and sadomasochism – not to mention academic pressures, rebellion and suicide.

Although those topics are timeless, Wedekind was writing in the Victorian era, when formal sex education was nonexistent and pubescent urges were something to hide, not celebrate. That's why his play is not an American Pie-type romp, but, as the subtitle puts it, "A Tragedy of Childhood." The genius of the musical's creators, lyricist Steven Sater and composer Duncan Sheik, has been to keep the story grounded in the repressive 1890s, while at the same time giving its teen characters the liberating voice of contemporary rock.

Canadian Idol finalist Steffi D plays the bohemian Ilse in Spring Awakening. (Paul Kolnik/Mirvish Productions)

The result is the irresistible spectacle of shock-haired schoolboys in breeches and pig-tailed girls in frocks suddenly whipping out microphones and launching into raw, heartfelt tunes with titles like The Bitch of Living, My Junk and Totally F---ed.

"The songs are their inner monologues," Steffi D says. "It's like this great release. The only outlet these kids have is switching to modern times with these microphones and just singing our hearts out, just rocking out."

The story centres on smart, rebellious Melchior (Matt Doyle), his naïve childhood sweetheart, Wendla (Christy Altomare), and his depressive pal Moritz (Blake Bashoff). All three are experiencing the first rustlings of sexual desire, but what ought to be a wondrous time instead turns tragic, thanks to the meddling of heartless teachers and scandalized parents.

Steffi D plays Ilse, the kids' wayward friend, who ran away from an abusive father and now spends her time modeling for – and sleeping with – a colony of artists. "Ilse's kind of like the odd one out," she says. "She grew up before her time. Wedekind lived in those artist colonies and I think Ilse is a straight representation of a young bohemian lover he had at one point."

Just as she did with her Idol performances, Steffi D throws herself bodily into the part of Ilse, whose devil-may-care attitude masks a longing to return to the innocence of childhood. One of the spine-tingling highlights of this production is her angry/melancholy duet with Bashoff's suicidal Moritz, Don't Do Sadness/Blue Wind.

Despite her character's dark past, Steffi D says she finds Ilse easy to identify with. "As human beings, we've all been through some type of despair, not knowing where to turn and what to do. I think all the research I needed to do to play her was to look within myself. Even though I haven't been through the same specific situations that she has, I know what it feels like."

Certainly, Steffi D knows what it's like to be the colourful outsider. She got cast in that role during her time on Canadian Idol. And she played it to the hilt. When she wasn't befuddling the judges with her left-field song choices – Bowie, Ella Fitzgerald, the Cardigans – she was charming them with her kooky look, strutting the stage with little-girl bangs and a big bow in her hair. As Ilse, she's lost the bow but kept her brown bob. If she resembles anyone, it's that other free-spirited Wedekind character, Lulu – as immortalized by Louise Brooks in the silent film Pandora's Box.

Steffi D laughs at the comparison. "I've been told that many times, actually," she says. "One of my fellow cast members even got me [Brooks's] autobiography, Lulu in Hollywood. I have it in my trunk; that's my next read."

The cast of Spring Awakening, which is currently on a 21-city North American tour. (Paul Kolnik/Mirvish Productions)

Steffi D's "outsider" label on Idol had mainly to do with her status as a theatre geek in a sea of wannabe divas. Growing up in the Ottawa area, she was acting in community plays from the age of 11, and played the male lead in a high school production of Les Misérables. She says she auditioned for Idol on a whim, not out of any secret aspiration to be a pop singer. After she was knocked out of the running, the bilingual teen landed a role on a French kids' TV series, Moitié Moitié (Half and Half).

She'd moved to Toronto and was studying theatre at George Brown College when Spring Awakening beckoned. "A friend of mine came into class one day with a huge smile on his face and said they were having open [auditions]," she says. "I'd seen the show about a year and a half before that and fell in love with it and wanted to be a part of it so bad."

Steffi D was picked for the show's first North American tour, which kicked off last August in San Diego. After eight months and more than 200 performances, she says she's still growing in the role of Ilse. "I'm always making new choices, good and bad, onstage, and learning from it. If something doesn't work, I'll try something new the next day. Even offstage, I'm always thinking about it. It's always stirring in my mind – it's a living and breathing thing."

Offstage, Steffi D and the other 20 cast members – almost all of them in their teens and 20s – also spend a lot of time together. "Most of us don't have family in the cities we go to, all we have is each other, so yeah, we hang out a lot," she says. "And we love each other a lot. I think it really shows onstage because we're such a team now."

She says it's unfortunate one of her teammates – fellow Canadian Kyle Riabko, who played Melchior – had to drop out before the Toronto engagement. He's shooting a pilot for Limelight, a new series from Gossip Girl writer K.J. Steinberg. "It kind of ended up falling at a weird place, just as we were coming to Canada," she says. However, she describes his replacement, Broadway alumnus Matt Doyle, as "just fantastic."

Steffi D isn't sure what the future holds for her, but this show has taught her to aim high. "If there's this other amazing, unique, special, gutsy, beautiful project like Spring Awakening that comes along in the future," she says breathlessly, "I'd like to be part of that."

Spring Awakening runs at Toronto's Canon Theatre through April 19.

Martin Morrow writes about the arts for CBCNews.ca.