Why My Drama Camp was Better than Your Drama Camp

Some people have band camp… Some people have football camp… Others have space camp… Well I have DRAMA CAMP!

Drama Camp is possibly the best way to end an already great summer! The Troupe 5362 Officers spend all summer working extremely hard to set up this amazing experience for newbies and returning students. Drama Camp consists of singing, dancing, workshops, and some serious bonding. This year, the officers put together an opening and closing number and some workshops in between!

Day 1:

So the first day when I arrived I was already extremely excited for many reasons… I get to see all my friends, I get to get back into doing what I love most, and I got to finish out my last Drama Camp in the school that I first started theatre in (my middle school). I picked up my headband that had my name on it and put it on my head so everyone knew my name, I then sat down in the circle we were all making and basically began my day. The officers taught us old warm-ups and a few new ones that were super fun and totally got the energy flowing. The officers hadn’t told us about what numbers we were doing yet until warm-ups were all done. Our opening number… Welcome to the Renaissance from Something Rotten and our closing number Brand New Day from The Wiz. My troupe had seen Something Rotten on our trip to New York together so I thought that was pretty bittersweet. We worked on the music for these two numbers for the day and learned the choreography that the officers created to Brand New Day. We broke for lunch and snack time and signed up for a few workshops that the officers had put together! A great first day!

Day 2:

Day two! Walked in, grabbed my headband, and began warm ups. To start off my day, I went to my first workshop with CayCay Kelly and Katelyn Centers and it was basically helping us to prepare for auditions with monologues or songs! It was super helpful and I think a lot of people in our group learned a lot with the games we played on memorizing monologues and picking a great audition song that matches the show you’re auditioning for. After this, we got into our color groups (my group color was pink and my group leaders were Rayna Gordon and Emma Gullo) and began our auditions that we had prepared beforehand. Auditions were a mandatory solo or duet song or dance with a monologue. All the seniors went first then juniors then sophomores then freshman. A lot people I hadn’t heard sing before were incredible and we have some incredible talent coming into this program! I got to perform my audition with my best friend, Shelby Utz, with a song that has been an inside joke between us and about 10 other people since 7th grade and it is called Man or Muppet from the Muppet Movie. My monologue was from my favorite movie of all time Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, from a scene where Amy Adams is telling Will Ferrell he needs to be a race car driver again. It was perfect. After this, one of my favorite Troupe 5362 Alum came in and taught us music and his name is Kyle Carozza. Kyle Carozza was our troupe’s music director all year last year and did an incredible job (I have no clue how he does it honestly…) and he was asked to come back for this drama camp to teach music, which was so much fun. After our music rehearsal, we finished the choreography for Brand New Day. 

Day 3:

The last day… So this day opened the same as the rest, get our headbands, warm-ups. After this we got to do one more workshop, so I chose to do a stage mentality workshop with one of our troupe officers, Connor Buehler. We had a lot of fun in this workshop and honestly this workshop taught me a lot because having a great stage mentality isn’t my strong point… So this was a very good learning experience. Then, Kyle Carozza came back to finish and clean up the rest of the music for our two numbers. He did a phenomenal job and we were very blessed to have someone like Kyle teach us the music. After lunch, we began blocking our opening number Welcome to the Renaissance (which I have a solo in!!!) and it was super duper awesome. We ran both closing and opening numbers a few more times before our day came to an end.

Overall this was a great last Drama Camp and I wouldn’t have traded it for the world. Drama Camp is an incredible experience and I encourage more people to go because the friendships you make there, you keep the rest of the years in high school and are unlike any other friendships. I would also like to thank the officers for working so hard to put all of this together over the summer, I know you guys worked your butts off so thank you so much Olivia, CayCay, Connor, Rayna, Katelyn, Emma and Sarah for making it a great last drama camp for me and a great first drama camp for many others. Also a big thank you to Mrs. Smithwick, Mr. Grizzle, and Kyle Carozza, thank you so much for you’re help and guidance.

Thank you so much for reading! Don’t forget to comment and subscribe! Peace out!