Spring break theater opens for local students

JACKSON, Tenn. — You might want to sign up before the curtain closes.

One group is giving students the opportunity to showcase their talents as well as learn new skills.

This week local students have the opportunity to sing, dance, act and more with the Spring Break Theater Camp hosted at The Ned.

“We are the Children’s Theater Company, and we’re here in August with Henry Box Brown, but Out Grant is a two part grant. So through this grant we got to bring Henry Box Brown and follow it up with some type of community engagement,” said Mehr Mansuri, the founder and the Artistic Director for Children’s Theater Company.

The camp is a week-long program giving participants the tools they need to be a great entertainer.

“We don’t come in and kind of superimpose something on top of what is here, but we really try to develop from within from the grass roots and get people in this work,” said Eric Dozier, a composer/director for the Children’s Theater Company.

Students will be learning these skills from not only Mansuri and Dozier, but from local talent as well.

“They can expect to act and they can expect to think. And it’s four days of it,” Dozier said. “Four days of really thoughtful, creative activities that are meant to change the world.”

The camp is four straight days, and it is all leading up to their final performance on Saturday.

“So it’s homegrown with a little New York sass to it, and our goal with the sass is to kind of look at theater as a tool for moral reasoning and to give kids and youth a chance to see themselves as the voices of positive change,” Mansuri said.

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