Cleveland Public Theatre tours a production throughout the city every year. The writing is original, the set is built just for this show, and it鈥檚 all done in eight weeks. This would be difficult for a group of professional artists, and this production is actually created entirely by teenagers from the Cleveland area.
CPT鈥檚 Student Theatre Enrichment Program, or STEP, is a way to teach mostly low-income middle and high schoolers about theater and also provide job training along the way.
Many of the students involved don鈥檛 actually plan on having a career in theater. Fourteen-year-old Gyasi Turner is one of those teens. He鈥檇 like to be a biologist or zoologist so he can study or take care of animals.
鈥�(Theater is) not one of my long term goals, but definitely is a possibility,鈥� Turner said.
This is Turner鈥檚 first year in the program. He鈥檚 a costumer, so he helped design and create the costumes, despite not having any previous experience. He says he learned to sew during the program.
Many of the skills STEP hopes to teach have nothing to do with theater. Tatianna Acoff is a junior at Max S. Hayes High School on the west side of Cleveland. She wants to be a registered nurse or maybe join the military. Although those career choices seem very different from theater, she says the skills she鈥檚 learned can help her in any job.
鈥淒on鈥檛 get overwhelmed, and try, don鈥檛 get frustrated,鈥� Acoff said.
Acoff and the crew helped design the set, which reflects the play鈥檚 setting of a dystopian future. Adam Seeholzer works for Cleveland Public Theatre, and he鈥檚 the program manager for this student production. He says the set was designed to look like the characters are at an abandoned steel mill, with smokestacks and a concrete column. He says it blends in with the real buildings in the area, near Outhwaite Community Center, where one of the productions occurred.
鈥淚t definitely fits into the environment,鈥� Seeholzer said. 鈥淭his is a part of our culture; this is a part of our city.鈥�
Seeholzer has been working with STEP since 2006. He says each year it鈥檚 important to allow the students to do the work.
鈥淎 lot is observing and delegating and letting them go through the motions of failing, and maybe they take the long way about it or they don鈥檛 do it the way that you would have necessarily wanted, but it鈥檚 their way of working, that they鈥檙e figuring it out,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e have built in our schedule enough time for error, and they鈥檙e kind of fixing and adjusting as they go.鈥�
Each year, CPT staff selects works of literature in a theme to help the teens write the script. This year, the theme is resistance, and the plot takes place in a future where art is illegal.
In the first act, freshman Quenisha Moss plays a military leader who has locked up those trying to rebel against her. Moss says she does want to be in theater when she graduates. In fact, she鈥檚 majoring in it at Cleveland School of the Arts. Moss says her favorite line is one she can personally relate to, where she asks one of her prisoners: 鈥淒o you know what happens to a black girl鈥檚 hair when it鈥檚 raining?鈥�
鈥淚 know that struggle myself, so when I read that line, I was so happy and so excited because I can relate to it, and I really know, so I was able to play with it,鈥� Moss said.
Seeholzer says letting the students write the script allows them to share stories from their personal experience.
鈥淚t is definitely their words on the page, and you really hear their voice, and most of what you hear on stage is what they personally wrote,鈥� he said.
The cast and crew are paid for their work, which is typically about five hours a day, five days a week, although sometimes it鈥檚 longer.
Seeholzer says the long days teach them to not give up.
鈥�No matter whether you鈥檙e working for Home Depot or the business tower at KeyBank, you鈥檙e using those skills in the work environment,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd that鈥檚 being professional, being on time, doing hard work, doing work that may not always be fun, and seeing it through all the way to the end of the project, regardless of how hot it is outside or how scorching the sun may be or how tired you are.鈥�
The 23rd season of STEP is over, but you can catch a new, student-produced production touring around the city next summer.
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