High school students attended the Houston Shakespeare Festival Summer Conservatory, hosted by the School of Theatre and Dance, for a two-week long camp. Students will also participate in the annual Houston Shakespeare Festival in August at Miller Outdoor Theatre. | Courtesy of Nicole Gamache
To prepare for the annual Houston Shakespeare Festival, the School of Theatre and Dance hosted a two-week conservatory that began Wednesday.
The Houston Shakespeare Festival Summer Conservatory is for high school students to attend classes such as Intro to Shakespeare, Stage Combat and Text Analysis to improve their acting, movement and vocal skills.
“We take classes every morning,” said high school senior Leah Hunt. “We have taken a class called Shakespeare Scansion, which is a rundown of iambic pentameter and Shakespeare’s blank verse.”
Classes are taught by some of the HSF actors from this year’s productions, “Antony and Cleopatra” and “As You Like It.”
“It’s cool that we’re being trained by professional actors,” Hunt said. “Shakespeare Scansion was taught by Benjamin Reed, who plays Orlando in ‘As You Like It.’”
The students learn about campus life. They stay in university dorms and eat at campus restaurants for the duration of the program.
“This prepares us for college,” Hunt said. “We have to get up early to eat breakfast and get to class on time.”
The students will also participate in the annual HSF in August at Miller Outdoor Theatre and perform in a “Green Show” prior to the Shakespeare masterpieces.
“The Green Show gets the audience engaged and teaches them a little something about the show they’re about to see,” said director and theater senior Nicole Gamache. “Some of the students even get to be involved in the HSF shows. A few of them play soldiers and have a few speaking parts.”
The conservatory serves as a transition into the students’ acting career. In addition to being introduced to professional actors, the students are able to network with each other.
“The reason why this program is so great because it starts their network,” Gamache said. “It helps them start to network in a professional environment. They get to be surrounded by professionals, and they learn what it means to do theater as your job.”
Even after the program is over, the ties that the students have built stay strong. Social media sites keep the students connected to each other.
“I love that the students leave here, and they’re all still friends. They keep in touch and go support each other by seeing each other’s shows,” Gamache said. “They might need these connections that they’re building in the future.”
High school senior Jayda Kolman, like many of the students, intends on using the Conservatory as an opportunity to start her career.
“What we learn here, we take into the real world,” Kolman said. “All the movement, acting choices and things we notice about the script are really going to help in the long run when we try to go professional.”
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