Drama dpt. prepares for KCACT Festival in Sacramento, Calif.

905436_audience_at_a_theatrePerforming on stage provides great opportunities to practice self-composure in front of an audience, improve public speaking skills and learn presentation techniques. Students brave enough to express themselves on stage this year have participated in the following productions; “The Foreigner,” “The Shadow Box,” “Spring Awakening,” “A…My Name will Always be Alice,” “Still Life of Iris” and “8.” The BC theatre arts department is bringing student actors, “The Badgers” tech Olympic Team” and the “Stone Tablet” improv group to the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival in Sacramento, Calif. from Feb. 18-22 at the American River College.

The Festival is a national theatre program with 18,000 students from colleges and universities. The festival is intended to provide opportunities to celebrate creative processes, evaluate other’s works and share experiences and insights within the community of theatre artists. Individual artists are recognized through awards and scholarships in playwriting, acting, criticism, directing and design. “We have been going to the festival on and off since 1990,” said Tammi Doyle, the chair of the Theatre Arts department at BC.

Performing at the KCACT Festival is a useful tool for drama departments like ones at BC. It allows students to interact with the production on new plays, study the classics, revitalized or newly conceived and to try some experimental works.  “We go for three main reasons. One is to take classes, workshops and see shows from other colleges and universities. It’s also an awesome opportunity for students to meet professors from four-year schools, The third reason that we go is to present work of our own and to compete in acting, technical theatre, we have in the past in design,” said Doyle.

KCACT Festivals take place all across the country. Region 7, which includes Alaska, northern Califoria, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, northern Nevada, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming, is one of the biggest sections of the festival. The festival celebrates diverse work produced in university and college theatre programs.

“The students meet 2-3 times a week; twice on their own and two times with faculty. The advisors meet with me three times a week. The students chose all of their material last fall, and they worked on the scenes, monologues and the songs to get ready,” said Doyle. She thinks the BC drama department is prepared to impress other schools and the judges at the festival.

“We’ve been asked to present a scene from two shows we did last year. We’re doing a song from ‘Spring Awakening,’ called ‘Totally F*cked,’ and we’re doing a scene from ‘The Foreigner,’ said Doyle in regards to the chosen material. The drama department is also bringing an original devised theatre piece title “Devising” which was created in the last seven weeks.

As a school, it’s time to encourage involvement in the BC theatre arts program and to celebrate their success as they go off to the festival. Check up what’s in store for BC competitors at http://www.kcactf.org or visit http://bellevuecollege.edu/artshum/drama/ for more information about the theatre arts department at BC.