Spring & Summer 2025 Programs
Enrollment for youth programs is through the Philipstown Rec. Department.
Art Thieves Conservatory
Art Thieves Conservatory is a hands-on, fully immersive theatrical experience for the brilliant and sneaky. Improv, singing, dancing, monologues, writing, YouTube videos and smeared clown make-up all wait within the walls of the ATC. (Previous experience and/or actual skill at singing and dancing not required, and if bad at it, must be really bad.)
Each year, the Art Thieves Conservatory chooses to steal a regular theatre production and create their own version. The regular actors are cast aside, the programs are torn up, and the audience is locked in. Details to follow. (Keep this to yourselves for now, as we don't want to give it away!)
The Dean of the Art Thieves Conservatory is professional actor Bill Coelius. A resident of Cold Spring, TV/Film teacher at T. Schreiber Studio in NYC, Bill has over 20 years of arts-in-education experience and is being released on bail for this special circumstance. www.billcoelius.com
Play in a Day
Saturday, 1/25/25, 10am-3:30pm (Performance at 3:00pm)
Do you love acting in a play and just can't wait to get to opening night? Then join the Depot Theatre for a fast-track, super-fun experience called A Play in a Day! In just one day, students will rehearse AND perform a short play for an audience! In addition, students will create characters with props and costumes and play improv games. The script for the workshop will be totally new to the students in class. Students will exercise their skills, make bold character choices, experiment and build the show together. At 3:00pm, the play will be performed for an audience!
Play in a Day Junior
Sunday, 1/26/25, 1pm-4:30pm (Performance at 4:00pm)
Do you love acting in a play and just can't wait to get to opening night? Then join the Depot Theatre for a fast-track, super-fun experience called A Play in a Day Junior, created specifically for students in 1st-3rd grades! After some improv games, students will rehearse AND perform a short play for an audience! The script will be new text for the students in class, making this an exercise in ensemble theatre and literacy. At 4:00pm, the play will be performed for an audience!
Merideth Maddox Bio:
Merideth holds both a BFA (University of Florida) and MFA (FSU/Asolo Conservatory) in Acting and worked as a performer in regional theatre before moving to New York and beginning her work in theatre education. While in NYC, Merideth was the Director of the Young Actors Program at The Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, a teacher of acting technique at the Professional Performing Art School, an annual guest lecturer at the School of Visual Arts and a private audition coach. Merideth relocated to Westchester to teach at Hackley School, where she has been teaching middle school theatre classes and directing multiple productions each year since 2009. Her favorite thing to tell young actors is "make bold choices!"
About our youth programs:
Our youngest students, kids in first through third grades, are introduced to theater through a series of fun, interactive classes: Stories for the Stage; Making a Play; and Twisted Tales. Older participants, in fourth through seventh grades, perform scripted plays in the spring and fall. In our Teen Mentor program, teens meet with theatre professionals over the course of a year, study the many facets of staging a play, including directing, set design, costumes, choreography, stage-managing, marketing and development, and put what they learn into practice.
Each summer we stage a pair of ambitious musicals: one stars middle schoolers and is produced entirely by the members of our teen mentor program; the other stars teens under the guidance of experienced directors, choreographers and set designers.
The kids and teens who participate in the Depot’s youth programs get hands-on experience in a working theater. They feel the incandescent thrill of putting on a show. And they learn a lot, too. In addition to the singing and dancing, kids develop their speaking and listening skills. They learn the value of preparation and how to handle the unexpected. They learn how to stand in the spotlight and work together as part of a team toward a common goal. And they have plenty of fun.
To learn more, write depottheatremembership@gmail.com or call (845)424-3900.
