The Auburn Public Theater is getting a head start on preparing its future stars for the stage.
Jason Rearick / The Citizen
The Auburn Public Theater is starting a children's summer theater program. Enchanted Black Box and Mariolio will show children the art of acting, creating costumes and building sets, among other things.
The Auburn Public Theater is starting a children's summer theater program. Enchanted Black Box and Mariolio will show children the art of acting, creating costumes and building sets, among other things.
This summer, Enchanted Black Box and Mariolio will offer children from the community a chance to study the craft of theater from behind the scenes and on the stage. For four weeks, young dramatists will learn all dimensions of the art, from creating costumes to building sets to acting. The result will be a theatrical production during the last week of the class for parents and the public to enjoy.
“Part of the mission of the Auburn Public Theater is to create programs for school-age children that are by children and for children,” said Angela Daddabbo, the theater's artistic producing director.
Daddabbo feels the classes will complement the school theater programs that emphasize the performance aspect by building skills both on and off the stage.
“It's like when kids sign up for baseball, they practice and they play,” she said. “We want to set up the practice.”
A class of students ages 6 through 8 will practice puppetry with instructor Mario X. Soto - stage name Mariolio - who will teach the children how to design their own puppets.
Soto brings to the Auburn Public Theater 25 years of theatrical experience, which includes time with touring companies of musicals “Hair” and “A Chorus Line” in the United States and Europe. He has spent the last decade devoting himself to children's theater by taking his “Mariolio and the Hip Hoppets” puppet show around the Northeast.
In its second year at the theater, Soto's two-week class will double in duration to seven hours each day. In that space, he will focus equally on puppetry and human theater. When the children aren't engaged in acting exercises, they will craft their own hand-and-rod style puppets from found objects and classic puppet building blocks like felt and yarn.
Soto's students will also write and perform - with their puppets - a short show to precede the older students' production of “Winnie the Pooh” on the Black Box stage. Some of them will also perform in the show. Soto believes the experience will “build an appreciation for the arts” in his young students.
“It'll be lots of fun. I think teaching kids at a young age to enjoy the arts is something long-lasting that they can have for rest of their lives,” Soto said.
Soto hopes the class will include a few students from last year's summer acting program at the Auburn Public Theater, where his students put together an improvised TV show with a rock star as the centerpiece.
“He came in with Elton John glasses; it was hysterical,” Soto said.
Children ages 9 through 15 will spend the four weeks in Enchanted Black Box working toward a production of “Winnie the Pooh” under the instruction of Ron Ritchell and Polly Hogan. The classes will build acting skills through dramatic exercises and rehearsals for the show. As the children prepare for the stage, Ritchell and Hogan hope to steer any children from seeking only the stardom of theater.
“Acting is a totally selfless process,” they said in an e-mail. “The actor must shed his or her own personality and put on the character being portrayed.”
In addition to acting, children in the Enchanted Black Box class will get a taste for the different departments that play a significant role in putting together a show. Working on “Winnie the Pooh” will give them a chance to dabble in make-up, costuming and some set design.
Ritchell and Hogan expect the class to benefit the children in ways that last well beyond the time they exit the stage.
“We hope that participation in this program will give the children a greater self confidence, a sense that theater is fun as well as hard work and a sense of accomplishment gained from a job well done,” they said.
With the program still in its infancy, Daddabbo and the instructors are optimistic it will grow into a larger one that attracts more children who want to involve themselves in theater.
“It's really about offering kids, who are such sponges, an opportunity for this training at a very young age,” Daddabbo said. “While it's still totally fun for them and they don't know they're working.”
Staff writer David Wilcox can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 245 or david.wilcox@lee.net
“Part of the mission of the Auburn Public Theater is to create programs for school-age children that are by children and for children,” said Angela Daddabbo, the theater's artistic producing director.
Daddabbo feels the classes will complement the school theater programs that emphasize the performance aspect by building skills both on and off the stage.
“It's like when kids sign up for baseball, they practice and they play,” she said. “We want to set up the practice.”
A class of students ages 6 through 8 will practice puppetry with instructor Mario X. Soto - stage name Mariolio - who will teach the children how to design their own puppets.
Soto brings to the Auburn Public Theater 25 years of theatrical experience, which includes time with touring companies of musicals “Hair” and “A Chorus Line” in the United States and Europe. He has spent the last decade devoting himself to children's theater by taking his “Mariolio and the Hip Hoppets” puppet show around the Northeast.
In its second year at the theater, Soto's two-week class will double in duration to seven hours each day. In that space, he will focus equally on puppetry and human theater. When the children aren't engaged in acting exercises, they will craft their own hand-and-rod style puppets from found objects and classic puppet building blocks like felt and yarn.
Soto's students will also write and perform - with their puppets - a short show to precede the older students' production of “Winnie the Pooh” on the Black Box stage. Some of them will also perform in the show. Soto believes the experience will “build an appreciation for the arts” in his young students.
“It'll be lots of fun. I think teaching kids at a young age to enjoy the arts is something long-lasting that they can have for rest of their lives,” Soto said.
Soto hopes the class will include a few students from last year's summer acting program at the Auburn Public Theater, where his students put together an improvised TV show with a rock star as the centerpiece.
“He came in with Elton John glasses; it was hysterical,” Soto said.
Children ages 9 through 15 will spend the four weeks in Enchanted Black Box working toward a production of “Winnie the Pooh” under the instruction of Ron Ritchell and Polly Hogan. The classes will build acting skills through dramatic exercises and rehearsals for the show. As the children prepare for the stage, Ritchell and Hogan hope to steer any children from seeking only the stardom of theater.
“Acting is a totally selfless process,” they said in an e-mail. “The actor must shed his or her own personality and put on the character being portrayed.”
In addition to acting, children in the Enchanted Black Box class will get a taste for the different departments that play a significant role in putting together a show. Working on “Winnie the Pooh” will give them a chance to dabble in make-up, costuming and some set design.
Ritchell and Hogan expect the class to benefit the children in ways that last well beyond the time they exit the stage.
“We hope that participation in this program will give the children a greater self confidence, a sense that theater is fun as well as hard work and a sense of accomplishment gained from a job well done,” they said.
With the program still in its infancy, Daddabbo and the instructors are optimistic it will grow into a larger one that attracts more children who want to involve themselves in theater.
“It's really about offering kids, who are such sponges, an opportunity for this training at a very young age,” Daddabbo said. “While it's still totally fun for them and they don't know they're working.”
Staff writer David Wilcox can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 245 or david.wilcox@lee.net
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