Youth Theatre
FUEL YOUR CREATIVITY:A summer workshop for students to create an Immersive Theatre event.
The Playmakers will introduce the concept of immersive theatre to Mid-school and High School students (perhaps some UE students) with the expectation that they will grasp the concepts enthusiastically that will stimulate their imaginations so they can plan a creative event for their peers and willing adults as well. It will offer an opportunity for students to learn the concepts and types of immersive theatre and will give them basic skills needed to create an event and perform it. That future event will take place outside the theatre. They will learn improv, character development and role-playing that character with audiences. Immersive Theatre works to bring the audience into a larger role in a creative narrative. It’s innovative!
The opportunity for students who participate in the arts in such non-traditional ways is encouraged. We hope that students will be excited to join a “community” of those who share similar creative interests, whether or not they have previously participated in theatre—costumers, writers, artists, new actors. Since this is a new challenge for all of us, we must work and learn together to mount an event after the workshop has ended.
Interactive theatre is one of the simplest forms of Immersive Theatre. In June, 2019, The Playmakers produced an interactive version of “A Child’s Garden of Verses” for pre-school students. Some other Playmakers’ plays have included interaction between adult audience members and actors: adults seem reluctant to take part this way, though they enjoy watching those who are willing to engage with actors. More expanded forms of immersive theatre have not been produced in our geographic area nor explored in area school systems: This will be The Playmakers’ first attempt to create an immersive event. It is a fun creative risk to take.
Our youth theatre students will be invited to participate and a major effort will be taken to identify and recruit those students in our area who create primarily in the digital world. Young people today are part of a 'participatory arts culture': "...one where there are relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, where there is strong support for creating and sharing what one creates with others, and where there is some kind of informal mentor-ship where what is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices.” As early as 2005, a Pew research study reported that 57% of teens who use the Internet could be considered media creators, defined as someone who created a blog or webpage, posted original art work, photography, stories or videos online or remixed online content into their own creations.