ESTEVAN - The Souris Valley Theatre started their summer camps programming this week.
Act I is underway for students ages six to eight and will end on July 8. It will be followed by Act II for kids ages nine-12 on July 11-15. Act III will be July 18-29 for participants 10 years of age and up. The last camp of the season will be improv for anyone eight and up on Aug. 2-5.
In the first camp, participants learn about some fundamentals of theatre and play a lot of games, and then they recreate a little story, learning all about production and crafts that relate to that show. In the second camp, students get a bit deeper into some of the character explorations and then put on their own little show.
For the Act III camp, Maureen Ulrich, an author out of Lampman, created a play based on golf, which is a musical spin-off of this year’s main stage production at the theatre. The participants will work on the script for two weeks, going through a crash course on theatre, with some of them involved on stage and others behind the scenes depending on their interests. They will work on character development, costuming, lighting, sound and design, and come up with the production at the end.
Improv camp will be open to kids of different ages, who will learn about improvisation and compete against each other in teams.
Souris Valley Theatre president Allison Holzer said that they accept participants all the way through the beginning of each camp, and they would like to see more kids joining them this season.
"We would like to see more students enrolled," Holzer said. "There are four opportunities there for students to get involved with theatre camps. And Chelsey Driedger … is a trained arts ed. teacher, so we have a very qualified person down there working with the camps."
Driedger took upon the camp director's responsibilities this year. She has a background in theatre from the University of Regina. She has an arts education major with an education degree in theatre. She has the majority of her performing arts degree as well.
"It's going to be great. I'm really looking forward to it," Driedger said. "And I love the theatre. I love the space down there, and I'm looking forward to working with the kids."
All camps will allow participants to perform at the end with shows open to parents, friends and the community. Admission is by donation.
For more information about the camps or to register go to sourisvalleytheatre.ca
