Mill City Youth Players Return!

Article by Claudia Kittock

The Friends of the Mill District, in partnership with the Guthrie Theater, are excited to announce that the Mill City Youth Players will return. If you missed the first show, Be Seen, Be You, Belong, you will have another chance to watch these incredibly talented young people perform on the Dowling stage.

A scene from Be Seen, Be You, Belong

The plans include 21 sessions. Seven will cover voice and movement, seven will cover text analysis, and the last seven will be choosing and preparing the production. Our hope is to have 3 shows at the Dowling over a weekend, which would include a Friday, Saturday and Sunday show.

An essential part of this program will be teaching these young actors problem solving and creativity. To do that, they will learn the language of the theater, and to do that, they will need to attend plays. This session will include tickets to 4 different productions at 3 different theaters. The actors will attend these productions together so that they can talk and learn about what they have seen as a community of actors.

We are so very excited to begin again. The pilot project was a huge success. Two of the actors got jobs as a result of their experiences, and others have had auditions because of the work they did at the Guthrie.

This is a community project and we will need community involvement.  We will provide more information as we decide on the dates for this project. If you are as excited as we are, please think about getting involved. 

How will you be able to help? We will need:

• Community volunteers to provide snacks for the beginning of each class/rehearsal.
• Community volunteers to provide dinner at the end of each class/rehearsal.
• Donations to help defray the cost of paying the salaries of the teaching professionals.

For questions and comments, please contact Claudia Kittock at cjkittock@gmail.com.