JT Studio- Unstuck: Acting Through the Body

Grades 7-12

Move with purpose. Perform with power.

In this active and confidence-building class, actors will learn (in a safe and fun environment) to use their whole bodies (using text and song ) to find their authentic expression as they enter a room, audition, and in performance.  Instead of unmotivated or indicated movement, students will explore ways to move with purpose, freedom, and emotional connection — through time-tested exercises, playful physical exploration, and expressive movement techniques.

We’ll focus on:

• Building body awareness and confidence

• Breaking out of “static gestures” in auditions and performances

• Using impulse and psych-physical movement to bring characters, songs, and scenes fully to life

• Tapping into real feelings while keeping performance playful and theatrical

Actors will leave with greater presence, more authentic expression, and tools to feel grounded, bold, and alive in their work — whether acting, singing, or dancing.

Come ready to move, explore, and have fun discovering your most expressive self!

JT Studio programs are fast-paced, high-energy intensives designed for teens looking to elevate their performance skills. Tailored for grades 7-12, these programs offer a deep dive into performance and technique, challenging students to refine their craft in a professional-style rehearsal environment.

Grades 7-12

Welcome to the new JT studio, a series of intensive programs geared towards students looking for advanced training. Ideal for students pursuing musical theatre at a high level, this course builds the confidence, technique, and artistry needed to shine in both solo and collaborative settings.

Approaching Shakespeare as we do - as actors interpreting his work four centuries after the plays were performed, we inevitably tend to focus on the language -  on giving life to his soaring rhetoric and expansive thinking.  However, the theater of Shakespeare's day which he both embraced and reinvented was largely one of physical spectacle.  In all of his plays, intellectual and spiritual reflection is made more vivid by contrasting it against scenes of broad physical comedy, grand buffoonery, and antic folly on the part of the rustics, clowns and fools.   In many of Shakespeare's comedies these elements of inversion and anarchy become dominant.  These plays draw upon performance traditions such as Commedia Dell’arte, Morality plays, and even Elizabethan holiday pageants -  all forms which delight in physical exuberance and fully embodied characterization.    The class will focus on engaging the stock character physical forms of Commedia Dell’arte and applying them to characterization in Shakespeare's plays where the influence of Commedia is at the forefront.  Students will also learn to play within and exploit the unique actor-audience relationship that many of his comedies revel in.   Drawing upon material from The Comedy of Errors, Much Ado About Nothing, and The Tempest, students will learn an approach to Shakespearean comedy that is expansive, extempore, and flirts with a kind of sublime anarchy that can liberate and enliven Shakespeare's work, as well as the actor performing it.

Grades 7-12

Make theatre that moves people.

In this active and collaborative workshop we will explore choreography and composition in a creative, playful and supportive environment. Dancers and non-dancers are encouraged to join as we explore, create, deconstruct and develop how movement tells a story and moves an audience.

Together we will explore:

• Theme and variation
• Motion and locomotion
• Emotion and story elements
• Focus and Dynamics

 In small and large groups we will:

• Develop short movement phrases
• Layer them with music, levels, and intentional creative choices
• Edit and revise with instructor and peer input