Super Sunday at WCSU
Join us on Sunday, October 13, 2024 for a Super Sunday with the Department of Theatre at WCSU! All high school juniors and seniors are encouraged to attend this free event. At Super Sunday, you will get a look at our facilities including our state-of-the-art Visual and Performing Art Center, take workshops with our esteemed faculty in your area of interest, get to know our current students, and see a matinee of our mainstage musical Legally Blonde: The Musical for free!
Registration will open in the next few months. Email svpa@wcsu.edu for inquiries.
Full schedule of Super Sunday
8:00am-8:30am – Check-in
8:30am-9:20am – Welcome by WCSU Dept. of Theatre Faculty
9:30am-10:50am – Workshop 1* (Your choice from below options)
11:00am-12:20pm – Workshop 2* (Your choice from below options)
12:30pm-2:00pm – Lunch Provided with Current Students and Faculty
2:00pm-4:30pm – Legally Blonde: The Musical performance
4:30pm-5:00pm – Q&A with Cast and Technicians, Wrap up
Options for Workshop 1
- Lighting a Musical (Lighting Design)
- How to Survive Culinary Murder Mysteries (Props, Stage Effects and Makeup)
- Don’t Buy the Director Coffee: They’ve Just Been Replaced (Stage Management)
- Nail That Audition! (Acting and Auditioning)
Options for Workshop 2
- See How The Magic Happens (Rigging, Scenery, Props, Lighting)
- From Sketch to Stage: How Costumes are Realized (Costumes)
- There’s No Tune Like a Showtune – How Songs Tell More Than They Tell (Analysis and Dramaturgy)
- Nail That Audition! (Acting and Auditioning)
About the workshops & faculty
Options for Workshop 1
Lighting a Musical
A Lighting Design Workshop
How do lighting designers create the exciting and eye-popping lighting required for a musical? In this session you will get to explore the lighting plot for Something Rotten, and then get a chance to create your own lighting for a musical sequence using the state of the art lighting equipment. Hosted by Oliver Wason, Coordinator of the BFA Theatre Arts – Design/Tech program. His designs have been seen at Lincoln Center Theatre, Atlantic Theatre Company, Yale Repertory Theatre, and more.
Don’t Buy the Director Coffee: They’ve Just Been Replaced.
A Stage Management Workshop
Come join John Bonanni, Coordinator of the BFA in Theatre Arts – Stage Management program for an informative and interactive 80 minutes of advice and anecdotes in how to succeed in the battleground of stage management and come out a loved and respected leader. In this workshop:
- You will learn how to “call” a show and get a chance to call cues from a production number in the Radio City Christmas Spectacular.
- Witness how a broadcast TV director calls camera cues on their feet at the TONY Awards
- What it’s like to manage a rock concert like Madonna, Lady Gaga, 50-Cent, Aretha Franklin, and even Barry Manilow
- You will learn how to work with DGA Stage Managers in Broadcast Award shows like the EMMYS, the GRAMMYS, and the MTV Awards
- How to calm the high strung, the vulnerable, the nasty, the egotist.
- The secret to getting people to respond to you.
Stage management is an organizational leadership specialty. You manage inspiration, revelation, and ideas within a budget. If you are interested in becoming a leader of creative, sensitive, insanely wonderful people, this is your career. Bring tissues, understanding, and a lot of confidence, because you, my friend, are in charge.
John spent a career in stage and production management on 7 Broadway shows, 3000 concerts at Radio City Music Hall, 2800 performances of the Christmas Spectacular, 6 car show announcements, 75 hotel ballroom events, 3 pharmaceutical break-out meetings, and 2 street fairs. After all that, he just wanted to sit down and write. He holds an MFA in Creative & Professional Writing from Western Connecticut State University. His works have appeared in Adelaide Magazine, Poor Yorick Literary Journal, the Raven’s Perch, and The San Antonio Review. His backstage memoir, Just Off, Stage Right, is available at amazon.com and adelaidebooks.org.
Nail That Audition!
An Acting and Audition Workshop
Improve your audition skills. This is a workshop in sharpening your audition techniques. Learn how to prepare and perform better. We will go over script breakdown skills prior to performance and then tips and tricks on performing. Other areas covered will be material selection, relaxation and how to begin to approach the material. Please bring your audition material to perform with a short feedback section to follow. Or just come watch! This workshop is hosted by Professors Sal Trapani (Law and Order, One Life to Live, Circle East Theatre Company) and Pam McDaniel, Coordinator of the BFA Theatre Arts – Acting program.
Options for Workshop 2
See How The Magic Happens: Mounting a Mainstage Musical
A Behind the Scenes Technical Theatre Workshop
This workshop will take you backstage before the matinee performance of Something Rotten!, giving you a behind-the-scenes look at our state of the art equipment and facilities. See and learn all about the craft of technical theatre, ranging from stage rigging, scenery and props, to lighting. This workshop is hosted by Theatre Production Coordinator and Technical Director Tom Swetz.
A Costume Workshop
“There Is No Tune Like a Showtune”: How Songs Tell More Than They Tell
A Dramaturgy and Analysis Workshop
Want to write a great musical? Let’s listen to some songs from Hamilton and Follies to see how both the lyrics and the music work together to move audiences in ways that even the audience itself may not perceive. This workshop is hosted by Professor Dr. Don Gagnon (Author: The Politics of Oscar Hammerstein II).
Nail That Audition!
An Acting and Audition Workshop
Improve your audition skills. This is a workshop in sharpening your audition techniques. Learn how to prepare and perform better. We will go over script breakdown skills prior to performance and then tips and tricks on performing. Other areas covered will be material selection, relaxation and how to begin to approach the material. Please bring your audition material to perform with a short feedback section to follow. Or just come watch! This workshop is hosted by Professor Sal Trapani (Law and Order, One Life to Live, Circle East Theatre Company) and Pam McDaniel, Coordinator of the BFA Theatre Arts – Acting program.
For questions regarding Super Sunday, please email us at svpa@wcsu.edu.