Costumes, Accessories, Props and Stage Illusions Made Easy

207471 Resource 203097 203800 210601 1214250505092 1259597821002 Controlled What a Drama Teacher Does in the Summer, Part 3

Attending Thespian Conferences, part 2

During the next 28 years we traveled to the conferences every other year.  We primarily presented workshops on children’s theatre—see our recipe below developed from the 25 children’s shows we performed over a span of 20+ years. CHILDREN’S THEATRE RECIPE   6 Cups of Ingenuity, Imagination, & Invention   Ingredients   1/2 C           A strong opening 1/2 C           Color (mix this very well throughout the production, including set, costumes, & makeup) 1/2 tsp.        Setting 1/3 C           Moral 21/2 C         Movement  (this must include dance and music) 1/2 C           Animals 1 2/3 C        Audience involvement (doing chases, asking for help, holding imaginary objects/animals) Mix all ingredients well.  Let marinate about three to four weeks   Time:  1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes.   Yield:  A very successful play.   On several occasions we performed shows that were not written for children, using more clever traveling ideas. For Thurber Carnival we purchased the slides along with the scripts.  However, we did not want to worry about a slide projector and screen so we transferred the drawings from the slides to white poster board and created boxes. Each box required six pieces of poster board, all the same size (a top, bottom and four sides). We copied, in black, Thurber’s line drawings, one for each piece of poster board (giving us six different settings). Five holes were punched on each side and the posters were then laced together with black yarn. As each new story was presented the boxes were turned to illustrate that story.  The cardboard laid flat when not laced, making traveling a breeze. This would work well for designs of walls or trees, as well. The set and costumes for Elizabeth 1 were created out of “found” objects our drama department had acquired over the years.  See <a title="A complete toolkit for theatre arts" href="https://www.meriwetherpublishing.com/CatalogDetails.aspx?cat=153" target="_blank">The Drama Teacher's Survival Guide</a>  for a detailed account of that production. Below is an excerpt.  <blockquote dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px"> All wore leotards I had on hand, the boys wore sweat pants and running shorts, and the girls wore muslin rehearsal skirts. For Elizabeth we used a child’s inner tube to add fullness to the skirt, a cut off sweatshirt for her top, and a paper crown we had gotten for our production of Cinderella. </blockquote> You can find a picture of Elizabeth 1, Mary Queen of Scots, and Burley under <a href="http://margaretfjohnson.com/The_Drama_Teachers_Survival_Guide/Photos_To_Enhance_Your_Reading.html">Photos To Enhance Your Reading</a> on my web site <a href="http://www.margaretfjohnson.com/">www.margaretfjohnson.com</a>. 9 application/xml false children's theatre Theatre conferences theatre costumes traveling sets Costumes, Accessories, Props and Stage Illusions Made Easy This book's numerous drawings explain in detail the costuming process of "turning straw into gold." https://www.meriwetherpublishing.com/CatalogDetails.aspx?cat=146 Instant Period Costumes How to make classic costumes from cast-off clothing https://www.meriwetherpublishing.com/CatalogDetails.aspx?cat=113 Stagecraft 1 The what, when, and why of stagecraft https://www.meriwetherpublishing.com/CatalogDetails.aspx?cat=23 Meriwether Publishing Homepage Your best source for theatre and drama resources https://www.meriwetherpublishing.com/ Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 5.1; Trident/4.0; .NET CLR 1.1.4322) 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 edassist 63.255.31.98 false true false false true 218193 false false true false false false true 203097 blog blogsite/ContemporaryDrama/web