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Meet Rebecca, our Summer Education Intern!

7/9/2014

Rebecca is rockin' it out teaching Culture Splash classes at the Chicago Park District Lincoln Park Summer Camp. She'll also be joining us at for Wizard of Oz summer camp in Waukegan and in Chicago, and assistant teaching Preschool Camp in Chicago!

Even with all of that on her plate, she indulged me with an interview:

What's your favorite article of clothing?
I really like sweaters.

What's a book that every kid should read?
Every child should read Dr. Seuss, anything and everything by him.

What was your favorite subject in school?
My favorite subject was math, but only if I could understand what was going on, otherwise English.

Best summer activity:
I really enjoy going for walks in the summer, possibly enjoying an ice cream cone.

If you could have a superpower, what would you choose?
I would choose flying because traveling wastes so much time.

What job would you have if you weren't in theatre or education?
If I wasn't in theatre or education I would love to be a lawyer or a therapist.

If you had a time machine, where and when would you go?
If I had a time machine I would go back to 5th grade and tell myself to embrace my talents and not be scared.

What would you take to a desert island, besides food or water?
I would take somebody to talk to on the island.

If you had to eat one thing for breakfast forever, what would it be?
I would forever enjoy everything bagels with vegetable cream cheese.

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Behind-the-Scenes Super Secrets #2

7/5/2014

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Okay, so I know it's been months since I promised you installment #2 of the Behind-the-Scenes Super Secrets series. And I'm super sorry.

Here is Behind-the-Scenes Super Secrets #2: Music!

This sad puppy has been waiting for months for this blog.

When we left off back in January, we were talking about the script -- how the words on your page get from someone's brain onto the page and into actors' hands. We discussed playwrights, lines, and stage directions. We talked about how there are usually lots of versions of the script -- called drafts -- written before the playwright shares his or her work with other artists.

One important part of those drafts is developing the music and the lyrics, and that's what I'll focus on today. I write the lyrics (the words in songs) and the melody (the main tune, the series of notes that go up and down -- and that get stuck in your head) for songs in Compass Creative Dramatics scripts. As I work on lyrics and melodies, there are a couple of things I try to keep in mind.

1) Compass students have to learn fast. Right? Once the show is cast on Monday, we might go through a scene or two together that afternoon. But after that, each group in the cast gets to meet with one of our educators for just an hour or two on Tuesday to learn the entire show - that means all of your scenes, songs, and dances.

Therefore,

2) Catchy is a good thing. After we teach you your scenes, songs, and dances, we let you know that it is imperative (that means very, very important) that you go home and review them on your own or with your families, so that you are ready for rehearsal the next day. If you walk out of Alice in Wonderland rehearsal with, say, "It's a Fine Day for a Picnic" stuck in your head (and you will!), it makes it that much easier for you to remember your melody and lyrics so that you can rehearse at home.

Once I've written (most) of the music, we'll bring on an arranger -- someone with the musical skills to take the melody I've created for your voices, and add an instrument (or two, or three, or twelve) to back it up. With Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, we opted to go for one instrument -- piano.

For Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, we asked musician and composer Josh Holte to create the piano arrangement for us. Once we had Josh on board, I handed the music over to him. With most of our collaborators, we use a program called Dropbox (shoutout to Dropbox! woo!) to share digital files. We'll also use email, or meet with artists in person or via Skype (shoutout to Skype! woo!).

Since Josh lives in Wisconsin, we relied a lot on email to send files back and forth, make notes, and communicate changes. I sent him the original melodies, as well as thought about feelings I wanted people to have listening to the accompaniment, and anything other notes about the song.

Here is an excerpt (a small piece of a larger hole) from the original notes I sent Josh along with mp3s of the melodies.

See?

Josh took those notes and created some pretty great first drafts. When he emailed me his first drafts, I was able to provide him more detailed notes -- what worked well, what we wanted to keep, what sorts of tweaks needed to be made. We worked together to create several drafts of his compositions, and between his writing and my notes we ended up with lots of fun tunes that we got to try out with students at the Script Development Workshop in Waukegan in March -- and which we'll get to share with all of our summer campers in 2015!

I. Can't. Wait.

But for now, IN TWO DAYS we begin Summer Camp 2014 -- The Wizard of Oz. We are going to have four spectacular weeks of Munchkins, Flying Monkees, Winkies, and of course, Dorothy, Toto, and all of their friends.

Come check us out!
Bedford, IN (July 7-11)
Sheboygan, WI (July 14-18)
Waukegan, IL (July 21-25)
Chicago, IL (August 4-8)

There is still time to join us in all four cities - so check out the link above to learn how to register for the fun.

I can't wait to see you!

- Cathlyn

P. S. This is Josh, with his family. Josh is the one in the bunny suit. Looks good, right?
j/k j/k. He's the dude on the left.

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Behind-the-Scenes Super Secrets #1

1/29/2014

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Theatre camp is super fun and awesome, right?

You go, you make lots of friends, you work hard learning lines, you study songs and dances, you put on a costume and look terrific, you thank your wonderful audience by taking a bow, and your parents and friends are rightfully proud of all of your hard work.

But.

Before all of that - before we even meet you on the first day of camp, there is so much we have to do to make sure that everything is ready when you arrive.

Over the next few months, I'll pop into our blog here and there to talk a little bit about what goes into producing a play - long before the actors arrive.

Cassandra concentrates on her script, while a student studies her.

So. First things first.

You know those fancy folders you get from us? With the pages inside? With lots and lots of words? You might know by now that that's called a script.

Basically, a script tells the actors what to say and what to do. The words in the script that tell actors what to say are called lines. The words that tell the actors what to do are called stage directions.

So who makes the script? How do they do it?

The person who writes the script is called the playwright.

Wait a minute. If they write the play, then don't you mean play-write?

Nope! "Wright" is an word that we don't use very much anymore, but back when "being a playwright" became a thing, people used it a lot. Wright meant "to work" or "to build" - so when we say playwright, we really mean that that person is building the play, carefully using tools like words and other parts of language to build a story. You can find wright in some other names of jobs, like shipwright (people who build ships) and wheelwright (people who build wheels).

So does the playwright just write the words down and then give them to the actors?

Nope! There are a lot of steps to writing a play. Playwrights and other authors write many different versions of their stories, called drafts, before they show them in public. For me and for our new script, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, that first public showing happened last Monday at what we call a table read.

Wait, what's a table read?

For us, a table read means that we bring together a bunch of other actors, teachers, and playwrights, to read our script out loud, and tell us what they think about it. It's a really exciting time, and we learn a lot about the new script from being in a room with all of these people with individual ideas and viewpoints!

Before we had our table read, five different drafts of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland were written. And now that it's over, we'll use the ideas people gave us on Monday to write new drafts that will be even better and more fun for kids to perform!

These actors are working hard to make Alice's Adventures in Wonderland an awesome adventure for you!

Once we make more changes to the script, then we're ready to hand it over to kids who will help us get the words off the page and onto the stage!

Did you know that right now, here at Compass we're getting ready for our Spring Break Script Development Workshop at the Jack Benny Center in Waukegan? What that means for Waukegan, IL students is a week of theatre fun putting together a play (and for us, too!) but it also gives us a chance to make our new script even better by putting it in the hands of the actors it was meant for - kids!

Getting ready for our workshop is a lot of hard work - so I'll sign off for now. But keep a look out over the next few weeks for updates on what we're up to - I'll be sure to keep you in the loop!

- Cathlyn

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Meet Martha, our Spectacular Social Media Assistant!

9/1/2013

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Do you follow us on facebook or twitter?
Then you've probably already met Martha - but I want to introduce you formally.

Here she is!

That's Martha at The Bean in Millenium Park.

For Compass Creative Dramatics, Martha takes care of posting fun articles, pictures, and other material to our social media pages.

I chatted with Martha about some of her favorite things, and I wanted to share them with you!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Favorite subject when you were in school:
English

Favorite article of clothing:
Wellies (rain boots)

Favorite summer activity:
Swimming (lake, ocean, pool, a large puddle. I love being in the water!)

The superpower you'd choose if you could have one:
Pausing time

What job would you have if you weren't in theatre or education?
I would be a Seeing Eye Dog Trainer

If you had a time machine, where and when would you go?
I would love to go see a Shakespearian play at The Globe!

What would you take to a desert island, besides food or water?
My best friend, Chelsea

What's a book that every kid should read?
Harry Potter (the whole series)

If you had to eat one thing for breakfast forever, what would it be?
Goat cheese and spinach omelets

This is me and Martha as a Princess and a Pea, respectively, at the 2012 Auto Show!

Want to learn more about Martha? Check her out on our Freelance Artists page!

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It Begins!

7/2/2013

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Cassandra and I just returned home to Chicago from our first week of summer camp, in Sheboygan, WI. We spent the week with a wonderful all-girl cast, who threw themselves full-force into our rehearsals and workshops. We learned about improv, stage combat, make-up, and all sorts of other theatre topics, and we all had a blast at the Peas & Harmony performance!

We can't wait to meet our next cast in Chicago on the 15th!

-Cathlyn

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Forward>>

Meet Rebecca, our Summer Education Intern!

Behind-the-Scenes Super Secrets #2

Behind-the-Scenes Super Secrets #1

So. First things first.

Meet Martha, our Spectacular Social Media Assistant!

It Begins!

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