Center Stage Youth Theatre

Posts Tagged ‘Viola Spolin’

This subject has always interested me.  I have had experiences looking on when theatre professionals counseled students to understand their “type” and have thought that in the case of auditioning and in looking toward a career in the theatre, that this made great sense.  I have had my own experiences as the mother of children who have dissolved to the floor in puddles of despair after they were not cast as a character they were in no way suited for but dearly wished to play.  As the director of a youth theatre I have received angry emails from the parents of young actors who had in their own living rooms dissolved into these sad same little puddles when I did not cast them as the characters they yearned to be but were the wrong physical type, or not old enough, or not (oh I hate this) strong enough (at least at that point)  to play.

So in some ways I do think it is important for kids to know their “type.”

However!  From an educational standpoint I do agree that helping young actors stretch into new places can benefit them in so many ways. That:   “theater is a powerful instrument in conquering adolescent self – consciousness and insecurities.”  I also agree that playing new characters can help a teenager with those ever present teen issues:  discomfort in their body, discomfort relating to characters who differ greatly from who they are, and can offer a world of useful opportunities to enhance social  and collaborative work skills.

I feel improv activities such as the Viola Spolin work we have been studying here at USC will go a long way toward helping children access these creative goals in the classroom.