ASC Education

For teenagers, the ASC Theatre Camp (ASCTC) is more than just a summer camp or a theatre program: it’s a bona-fide game-changer. Twice every summer, ASCTC plunges high-school students into several weeks of intensive, immersive, incomparable programming in the Shakespearean Shangri-La of Staunton, Virginia - home of the American Shakespeare Center and the world's only recreation of Shakespeare's indoor theatre: the Blackfriars Playhouse. We transport students out of their normal lives and beyond their comfort zones, and they emerge not only with greater control over their craft and more preparation for college, but also with more confidence, more capability, and more capacity for growth and change. All ASCTC participants preview the college experience by living and working on the residential campus at Mary Baldwin University. They spend their days rehearsing with our staff of professional theatremakers, training with ASC actors, and learning from MBU professors, ASC scholars, and each other. And in the advanced four-week Renaissance session, they do it all (including cutting the script) as a collaborative company of equals, without the oversight of a formal director. But all work and no play makes camp a dull sport - even when working feels like playing. Mornings off bring sleeping in and brunching at the local Farmer's market. Days off bring trips to the park, swimming, water balloon fights, dance parties, and well-earned opportunities to luxuriate in languorous laziness. Three or four weeks of this chimeric, collaborative creativity culminates in the Final Performance Festival, where campers mount their final productions (for a packed house) on the Blackfriars Playhouse stage. The ASC Theatre Camp boasts a unique combination of performance training, academic discovery, preparation for college life and learning, and the magic of meeting others with the same passion and persistence. The experience teaches you more about Shakespeare, more about life, and more about yourself than you could ever learn in the classroom alone. Won't you join us?