Course Description

Tuesdays, 6:00-7:30 PM Open to all experience levels. Students are encouraged to take this course more than once, as the curriculum will rotate. Taking the Stage is JTC’s in-depth course for ages 14-18. The course is designed to incorporate new students* through review of core concepts at the beginning of each class, but will devote the majority of each class to in-depth, challenging work around each semester’s Topic Focus. The Topic Focus will rotate semester by semester to continually challenge returning students with new material. Students will learn through exercises and demonstrations; they will also study scenes from Shakespeare's play As You Like It and prepare monologues for performance, with an emphasis on understanding and communicating the text effectively through individual delivery and physicality choices, as well as teamwork with scene partners. Students should expect take-home work and will participate in an end-of-semester showcase, open to friends and family. Core concepts for review will include physicality, voice, tablework, characterization, stakes, status, staging, and theatrical imagination. The Fall 2026 Topic Focus (Shakespeare's As You Like It) will include studying and staging excerpts from the Bard’s comedies, histories, and tragedies, and exploring iambic pentameter, soliloquies, traditional staging, and audience interaction. * Students completely new to theater are very much welcome! We will send brand new students resources to do some study on their own ahead of class. Minimum class size is 5 students. Tuesdays, 6:00-7:00 PM Sept 15 - Nov 11, 2026