She was about 10 years old, a painfully shy girl with huge brown eyes and a mop of shiny brown hair. She had a nice smile—when it could be coaxed to appear.
She also stayed seated—refusing to participate—when the other children in the after school drama class eagerly leapt to their feet to start on whatever assignment teacher Donald Amerson gave them. She preferred to sit quietly and read her books or write in her folder. She hadn’t chosen to take this drama class. It was just part of the program she was enrolled in.
Amerson was convinced that she would blossom if she just gave it a try. He kept encouraging her, day in and day out.
“You’ll learn stuff about yourself you didn’t know!” he told her.
“Then one day,” he says, “the light bulb went on! She realized the similarities between writing and reading and drama.”
The girl almost overnight went from being a wallflower to an active participant with the other children.
It’s those kinds of stories that Amerson loves to share about the effect South Coast Repertory’s Neighborhood Conservatory can have on the children who participate in it. The program started in 1986 as a way to give underprivileged children in Orange County the opportunity to take drama and acting classes taught by professionals.
Amerson, who has a master of fine arts degree and is an actor and director, has been a part of the conservatory faculty since 2013. All faculty members are accomplished actors, writers and directors. They need to be in order to impart the real lessons of the theater to the children they teach.
South Coast Repertory—which ranks No. 34 on this week’s list of the largest nonprofit organizations operating in Orange County (see list, page 18)—offers the Neighborhood Conservatory Program to participants in existing children’s programs, such as after school programs and nonprofit organizations, as a way to supplement regular activities.
The program serves approximately 150 children through the Illumination Foundation and in extended day programs at seven local elementary schools.
“SCR has always had a mission of community involvement,” says Hisa Takakuwa, the program’s coordinator. “We have expanded this program in the last few years to serve as many children as we can.”
The conservatory served children at four sites when Takakuwa took on her role in 2005; it now has eight. Schools and nonprofit groups frequently reach out to SCR about the program.
“There are a lot of schoolteachers who are on our website, see the information about the Neighborhood Conservatory program, and want to know more,” Takakuwa says. “On our side, we reach out to places we feel will be a good fit for the program.”
SCR Theater Conservatory’s Education and Outreach Committee helps choose venues for the program.
Transforming Experience
The 10-week conservatory follows a syllabus that can be adapted to the group of children at a particular venue. The teachers, Takakuwa explains, are given freedom to adapt each lesson to the particular audience they’re working with.
The material spans a wide range of subjects that get the kids to think like actors and even playwrights.
Week three, for example, focuses on learning how props affect the storyline of a play. Week seven explores emotions, words and storytelling, and explores how physical awareness is affected by emotions.
“The teacher might say, ‘Imagine walking on Jell-O,’ ” she says. “Then the kids get up, and using just their imaginations act out wobbling around, falling down. They have so much fun with it!”
Kids may also be asked to “transform” ordinary objects into something entirely different. “Tennis rackets become guitars,” Amerson says.
They bring the skills they’ve learned together in a one-scene play at the end of the program for friends and family that they write and produce themselves.
Amerson recalls one play called “The Journey to the Magical Pearl.” The story centered on the adventures of a half-dozen princesses, a couple of doctors, and several astronauts as they searched for the elusive jewel. “The kids were totally invested.”
Confidence, Discipline
The tangible benefits of the conservatory are easy to spot: The kids learn acting skills and have fun while doing it. It’s the intangible benefits that are harder to recognize, but Amerson says he knows that at the program’s conclusion, the kids have something even better than the ability to pretend to be a mouse.
“These kids gain so much confidence, discipline and belief in themselves. As a teacher who works with an institution like SCR, it is wonderful to go into the neighborhoods. We reach students who may never have seen a play before. Now they get to be in one—it’s great.”
