{"id":26491,"date":"2020-05-07T18:15:51","date_gmt":"2020-05-07T22:15:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=26491"},"modified":"2020-05-07T18:15:56","modified_gmt":"2020-05-07T22:15:56","slug":"theatre-aurora-keeping-drama-kids-engaged-remotely","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/theatre-aurora-keeping-drama-kids-engaged-remotely\/","title":{"rendered":"Theatre Aurora keeping drama kids engaged remotely"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

While it seems like the sudden and widespread societal\nshutdown pulled the rug out from under children, Theatre Aurora is making every\neffort to not leave them rudderless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the COVID-19-related closures were announced, the\nbuilding had to close and the youth shows have been cancelled. But the resolve\nto keep their student members involved and engaged only strengthened. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen the advisory came that we could no longer gather in\ngroups at the theatre, I remember saying to Jo-Anne (Pulfer), our director of\nYouth Programming, that we would suspend (not cancel) the programs, and find a\nway to reinvent ourselves. I proposed that we create a program that could be\ndelivered online in a workshop or master-class format. I didn\u2019t want a\nstop-gap. I wanted a first-rate experience that the students could look back on\n5 to 10 years from now and think, \u2018Wow, that was a fantastic opportunity! I was\nreally lucky to have had it\u2019,\u201d said Jason Silzer, VP Productions at Theatre\nAurora.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Theatre Kids program (ages 10-13) and Young Company\n(ages 14-18) are both up and running, with online instruction and interaction\nwith guest speakers from the industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wanted to do everything in my power to get a program\nof some sort to all the students. It gives them a schedule, something to look\nforward to and a sense of normalcy,\u201d said Ms. Pulfer. \u201cA number of us have been\nmeeting to play games or do script readings online, everything from Shakespeare\nto film. Many of our musical members are putting together songs \u2013 vocal or\ninstrumental \u2013 and sharing them online too. It keeps us going and lets us\nshowcase our creativity without us being together.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Silzer pointed out that in order to make the program unique,\nthey are exposing students to topics in theatre that are often not even covered\nat university, and which they may not deal with until they are actually creating\ntheatre. \u201cWe tossed around the idea of bringing in guest speakers who made\ntheir living in the theatre arts to come and talk about their own career paths,\nand answer questions from the students, and we started reaching out to our\nnetworks,\u201d said Silzer, who was humbled by the reciprocation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe responses to those calls have honored and humbled\nme, and I still can\u2019t believe how willing people have been to say yes, and\nvolunteer to talk to us. We have people coming to talk about professional voice\nacting, film casting, script writing, festival performances, working as an\nin-house tech at a downtown theatre. We have an intimacy choreographer coming\nto talk about how to create and claim safe space and representatives from some\nof Toronto\u2019s most established professional houses coming to talk about the business\nside of show business,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their in-house instructors have been creating workshops\nand master classes on topics like forum theatre and approaching the technical\ndesign of a show as well, with little lead time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With their ongoing efforts, students have some semblance\nof being immersed in theatre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe seem to have struck a good balance of bringing in\nguest speakers from the industry \u2013 professional theatre, film and TV \u2013 and\ngiving them online instruction. Our students let us know what works and what\ndoesn\u2019t so the instructors have made changes to what or how they are teaching,\u201d\nsaid Pulfer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The team at Theatre Aurora will continue delivering their\nnew program up until mid-June. \u201cWe continue to plan for our AGM in June, and\nare starting to explore ways to engage both the public, and our members, in\nspite of restrictions that come from stopping physical co-location. Above all\nelse, we are planning for that exciting day when we can reopen our theatre to\naudiences and fulfill our mandate to produce shows that stand up against\nToronto\u2019s best theatres,\u201d said Silzer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the meantime, as they might agree, the show must go on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Kinjal Dagli Shah <\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While it seems like the sudden and widespread societal shutdown pulled the rug out from under children, Theatre Aurora is making every effort to not leave them rudderless. Since the COVID-19-related closures were announced, the building had to close and the youth shows have been cancelled. But the resolve to keep their student members involved […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6Th","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-07 07:16:32","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26491\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}