The ASC Theatre Camp hones your skills as a performer while further preparing you for the academic rigors of college life and learning… so you might as well earn college credit for it. The college credit course augments and enriches the interdisciplinary approach to studying Shakespeare and classical performance participants receive at ASCTC.
For everyone
All campers attend academic lectures and performance master classes, observe the ASC acting troupes in rehearsals and performances, and rehearse an hour-long version of a play by Shakespeare or other early modern English playwright for performance in the Blackfriars Playhouse. Woven through this experience is access to the American Shakespeare Center’s professional acting troupes, who serve as teachers and mentors throughout the three week program. The experience culminates in the participant’s performance of their own hour-long play at the Blackfriars Playhouse before an audience of family, peers, and the ASC community.
For College Credit Campers
The college credit course introduces campers to the upper-level resources available in a university library. In addition to the ASCTC program outline above, those seeking college credit meet an additional two or three times per week to complete two discrete units of study: “Director Dialogues” and “Practicums.” Director Dialogues are with the session’s show directors: each director will demonstrate their particular methodologies, techniques, and tactics for preparing text for performance using a selection from their play. With the course instructor, directors will discuss how the section under examination made its way from base to performance text.
By enrolling in the course, campers aim to improve their research and writing skills beyond their current level. For attending the extra class sessions, doing the reading, completing in-camp assignment, and turning in a final project post-camp, campers in the course can earn up to 3 college credit hours at a discount from Mary Baldwin University, which are transferable to other institutions. Enroll in the college credit course to get a head start on your college degree.
2020 college credit course
This course builds on the training participants receive throughout the #SHXCamp experience through the focused exploration and application of the practices employed by modern theatre practitioners in the preparation of early modern texts for performance. Specifically, this course delves into the plays of William Shakespeare and his contemporaries to examine different methodologies for cutting, rearranging, collating, or otherwise manipulating various and variant texts to create different desired narratives in performance — a perfect exploration for this multimedia-enhanced variation of the “normal” camp program.
Participants will learn different theories of text preparation from multiple sources (including actors, academics, editors, and directors) and have multiple chances to put their own emergent theories into practice through course assignments.
Click here to download the 2020 #SHXCamp College Credit Course Description & Syllabus
Session 2 college credit class campers review their cuts with ASC resident troupe member John Harrell.
Campers attending a history lecture with Dr. Mary Hill Cole, professor at Mary Baldwin University for both undergraduates and graduate students in the graduate Shakespeare & Performance M.Litt/MFA program.
Session 1 college credit class campers watch ASC resident troupe member John Harrell act out their cuts.
Dr. Paul Menzer, head of the Shakespeare & Performance graduate program at Mary Baldwin University, leads a seminar for the college credit class.
Camper Liam Riley taking notes in his script.
ASC theatre campers get "Ralphed" by ASC co-founder and Director of Mission Ralph Alan Cohen [far left].
Campers in a class with ASC Co-Founder and Director of Mission Dr. Ralph Alan Cohen.
Session 2 college credit class campers work through class readings.
Session 1 college credit class campers watch ASC resident troupe member John Harrell act out their cuts.
