Who Are They?: Celebration Barn – Part 5

Producing

This blog post is part of a series called Who Are They? where information is provided for the Maine Arts Ed blog readers to learn about community organizations and institutions that provide educational opportunities in the arts. You will learn that they are partnering with other organizations and schools to extend learning opportunities, not supplant. Please consider ways in which you can collaborate to provide excellent arts education for all learners.

This is the last of 5 blog posts about Celebration Barn which is located at 190 Stock Farm Rd, South Paris, ME. Thanks to Ian Bannon for providing the posts.

Celebration Barn Theater has a long history of producing new work that is crafted, innovative, and wildly alive. In the 70’s and 80’s the Barn’s founder, Tony Montanaro, trained and directed ensembles of touring performers in addition to helping individual artists create compelling works that are uniquely their own.

he Last Hurrah at Camp Maine
Photo by Davin Currie

The tradition continues with Amanda Huotari at the helm as Celebration Barn’s Artistic and Executive Director. Last summer, NYC’s Jeff Wirth wrote and directed The Last Hurrah at Camp Maine, a comic summer camp reunion. Celebration Barn’s property played the role of the oldest summer camp in the state as the story unfolded all over the grounds and all around the audience.

Those of you who participated in the performance experienced firsthand the power of Jeff Wirth’s unique brand of interactive theater. It was met with such rave reviews from our audience that we have invited Jeff back to the Barn this summer to teach and present his latest creation: StoryBox.

The StoryBox itself is a multi-tech stage designed specifically for interactive performances- where live performance seamlessly integrates with improvisational lighting, soundscapes, and video streaming.

Jeff will bring together an ensemble of interactive performers during a week-long intensive training at Celebration Barn. The ensemble members will emerge as, “‘quintuple threat’ performers, combining skills in acting, dramatic improvisation, story structure, social psychology, and technology.”

Inter-actors employ these skills to empower the audience members, referred to as spect-actors, to play and direct the action of each scene. Audience members are invited to engage in whatever way they are most comfortable. They may choose to participate or sit back and enjoy the show as usual.

We can’t wait to see what Jeff–and all of you spect-actors–have in store for us this summer!

For more information about Celebration Barn Theater workshops, visit their by CLICKING HERE.