<p>Starsinmyeyes, sorry I never responded to your earlier post and did respond to Isaac about the listing of activities on a college application. I have some thoughts on the many things you brought up and hope to respond at some point. I have to get to my work first while I have nobody at home today. I hope to try to respond to some of this when I can. Briefly, I totally know the issue about scheduling activities and conflicts having brought up two very actively engaged kids. Many of us here can relate. More later.</p>
<p>starsinmyeyes, You are very welcome! This was my second year at SDM and I was in Runaways.</p>
<p>Susan, I meant the part about including everything from age 6 more as a joke than as a serious recomendation. Yes, it is true that the applications have specific space for activities during high school, but there are places where they ask you if you want to include any other information about yourself. This would be a good place to tell them that you played violin for 10 years or that you were a junior gymnastic champion⊠The point is that everything can help.</p>
<p>Thanks for your well wishes. I know your d will have a great year! Give her my best wishes for me.</p>
<p>By the way, I just read the first page from this thread from over a year ago and I am pleased to say that I am randomly mentioned in it! And in the subsequent post. That makes me kind of weirdly proud. :-)</p>
<p>Hi everyone,</p>
<p>Iâm new here, but when I saw that there was a thread on SDM, I thought I would stop by and share my daughterâs experiences. She only spent one summer there, four years ago, when she was thirteen. Our view on that summer is some what mixed- but I donât think her experience was one that is typical of a camper there; she seemed to have a string of bad luck. </p>
<p>My daughter at that time had a unusually mature classical soprano voice, she sang a soprano song at her audition, and was very confident in her performance. </p>
<p>Some how she ended up being cast in a role that was completely wrong for her, it was a supporting role, with a big belty solo- something she couldnât even begin to tackle. Her voice was very pure at that point, no belt what so ever. She went to Konnie to explain her concerns, and Konnie switched her to an ensemble role in a different show. </p>
<p>She would have been happy with a normal ensemble role, but this particular show had very little for the ensemble to do. It seems that SDM usually finds shows that give everyone a chance to shine, but she spent 75% of this show doing nothing. That made for a very bitter group of kids; I know a lot of the parents complained. I didnât, as my daughter had been switched to that cast, so it would have been ungrateful.</p>
<p>She had hoped that, in going to Stagedoor, that she would meet some kids who were more like her. She has always had older friends, and been at odds with most people her own age. Unfortunately her roommates were rather immature; they were more interested in yelling four letter words, âfor no apparent reasonâ and playing strip poker. She was sad about this because so many of the other rooms were very close, and she felt left out. </p>
<p>She did eventually find some friends who she fit in with, which was the most valuable thing Stagedoor gave her. But they came from her classes, and the people in her show. She even had a young man offer to be her boyfriend during their time there, hehe. They are still in contact too. </p>
<p>Despite the set backs, she did get a taste of what makes people love SDM so much. She LOVED her classes, and once she found her group of people, she loved the social aspect as well. </p>
<p>So like I said, it was a mixed summer. But she walked a way glad that she went. And she DID want to go back the next year, but she was offered featured roles in three shows at an equity summer theater, and the year after that she had a play that she wrote produced in Hollywood. </p>
<p>I thought it might be valuable to hear from someone who had a few ups and downs, I think if you went expecting everything to be wonderful and perfect that the experience would be disappointing. I guess itâs just like anything in the theater business, you have to take the good with the bad (only we parents are forking out the cash for it. LOL)</p>
<p>Hi Noracharles,</p>
<p>I totally agree with you that it is not 100% all wonderful. I think itâs half up/half down for many. This year I noticed on the message boards a local girl was going to SDM and offered to be her buddy family. She was my daughterâs age, but they were worlds apart. My daughter is very tall and mature (being an only child), and looks much older than her age because of her size. This little girl was very timid, although she participates in acting back home, and my daughter did all she could to help her out. The mom was wonderful and appreciative but the poor thing was disappointed with her role (the mom was too shy to approach Konnie about it) and the girls in her room tormented her. That is the downside to your first year at StagedoorâŠyou just never know who your bunkies will be. If you do meet nice people and hope to go back, at least you can request them on your forms. </p>
<p>The mom told me her daughter wanted to leave, but stuck it out. The previous year, which I hadnât known about, over 5 kids left the second week of camp because of the stress of classes and rehearsalsâŠOne gal had a similar experience it seems to yours. She was a model back home, almost 6 ft tall and had a beautiful soprano voice. She was sure she aced the audition, but instead they put her in ensembleâŠshe had been leads in plays where she lived and in regional theater. So after she saw her part, she called her mother, and flew back home because she didnât want to âwaste her timeâ - she thought sheâd be amongst professional kids and be able to shineâŠthe neighbor of this girl was there this year and told us the story; however, the reason they gave the girl for not giving her a good part - and this is coming 3rd party - was that they thought the girl had an eating disorder because she was so thin. She explained she ate like crazy and was model, but that was the reason they gave her for not giving her a lead. Who really knows.</p>
<p>My own daughter had a situation last year, where a girl came and scared the daylights out of her and the other roomies telling them she was abused by her stepfather and he put bullets in her bed at night and stabbed her with forksâŠshe was 10 years old. The girls finally called and told me, and I informed Barb and they investigatedâŠShe tried to strangle my daughter in her sleep and once while awake, and that was it for meâŠI called and they removed her from the room. But the state investigated and told the camp it wasnât fair that the other children were compromised and were not able to have a good time because of these stories; albeit, true or not. </p>
<p>When we send our children off to camp we just donât know the backgrounds of the other children and can only hope our kids will hold up under pressure. My daughter told me stories this year (now that she is in with the older girls but is only 11)âŠbut she was aware that the behavior of one or two of these girls was not good, and the rest of the girls had an intervention with her to let her know that her behavior was unacceptable. The camp actually found out about some of it, and for performance weekend, she had to stay in the hotel with her family and could not attend the awards ceremony or stay the last 2 nights in the room. So they are very strict if they find out whatâs going onâŠthatâs what the counselors are supposed to monitor.</p>
<p>There was a little boy in my daughterâs sessions for 2 years now and he does voiceover work, is the voice on one of the childrenâs programs on Nickolodeon, and was in Ant BullyâŠthat poor kid never had a speaking part in the 2 years he attendedâŠCan you imagine? Finally this very last session, this year (4th) he not only got a speaking part, but he got to sing in their biggest productionâŠeveryone fell in love with himâŠheâs so adorable and only 10âŠso you never know. </p>
<p>I can see your daughterâs disappointment, but at least she got to experience what it is to be in the background once, since it seems she is a shining star now and wonât have âto look backâ any longer! </p>
<p>Best of luck to her in years to come as well!</p>
<p>While it is good to hear about the different kinds of experiences that people have at Stagedoor, these examples are by no means the majority or even common. In the 3 years that I attended, there was only one kid that got in trouble for doing some questionable things. He was asked to leave. Things like this do happen, but they are few and far between. And 99% of the kids who attend truly do love it. I mean, my first summer I got a 4th degree sprain while in Pippin and I got really sick the next session and Devoloped a weird throat problem (very painful) and I still had an amazing time. If that canât deter a person then I donât know what can.</p>
<p>Oh, I completely agree, IJElkiss. Like I said, despite these things, my daughter still enjoyed many aspects of her time there. The purpose of my post wasnât by any means to deter people from sending their children to SDM, just to offer a different prospective.</p>
<p>Starsinmyeyes, those are some stories you have. Especially the one about the young girl claiming to be abused, she sounds deeply disturbed- I wonder how she ended up at SDM in the first place!</p>
<p>I think the casting situation was especially hard on my daughter because she WAS given a nice featured role (something she was not expecting) only to find out that it was something she was not right for. Her lack of a belt is something she has struggled with all of her life, (she played Annie at a dinner theater when she was 11 and the director named her âsoprannieâ because of her different sound.) and so it was very hard for her to give up the role. </p>
<p>But I did see a performance of that production, and the girl who replaced her was wonderful. She had a big broadway belt, and was obviously having a ball. It was her first featured role at SDM, and she had been there three years. </p>
<p>So I think going from an actual role, to a production where she had very little to do, was what was upsetting to her. Most of the time, I think that kids should be encouraged to enjoy being in the ensemble, not everyone can play a lead. Look at the little boy you spoke of, I bet he felt especially proud of himself having worked his way up! </p>
<p>But I do understand why parents complained about this particular production, because the lack of things for this ensemble to do was unfair, imho. </p>
<p>Itâs funny that you should mention her being a âshining starâ she is completing a production of Anything Goes this weekend where she is tap dancing her heart out in the background-- and having the time of her life at that.</p>
<p>Is it customary for SDM parents to complain/intervene to try to change the roles their children are given? I am not talking about calling the camp to ask for assistance with a problem roommate, or to report a difficulty that kids are having. I am asking about parents trying to put their hands in and get their kids recast. Does that happen often? And if it does, do the SDM folks give in? If so, that would definitely create some major problems, because it means that kids whose parents yell the loudest have the most influence over roles, and that seems very unfair to me. In the best of all worlds, it shouldnât matter if a kid has performed on Broadway and then comes to camp: that kid should be cast depending on his audition at the camp.</p>
<p>NotMamaRose, As far as I have noticed in my 2 years at the camp that is not the case. Most kids are cast depending on their audition and not the parts on their resume. A few examples:
A boy who was young Simba in the Lion King on Broadway came back this past session and was cast in ensemble in Les Miz.
Second session there were celebrity children that attended (including Courtney Loves D.) and I know she got cast in ensemble. Just a thing Iâve noticed in terms of âcelebrities and celebrities childrenâ at SDM , they get cast based on their audition at SDM not who they were in the past or who their parents are, which is nice.</p>
<p>Good to hear that, Defying. I guess I was a little surprised, knowing SDMâs great rep, that they would so obviously miscast Noracharlesâs D. So much so that the role had to be changed. But no one is immune to mistakes. Perhaps kids who have had major roles in their community/regional/etc. theaters and elsewhere naturally assume that they will be the âstarsâ at SDM, and when that is not the case, it generates disappointment. That would be natural, I would think.</p>
<p>NotMamaRose-
I think (at least from what I have heard via other parents and such) that it is easy for an interfering parent to get their childÂs show changed, if it is the SHOW itself that the camper is unhappy with. A camper can do that themselves, too. But I think it would always be ensemble- to ensemble. I really doubt that any child has gone from ensemble-lead because they complained.</p>
<p>I think my daughterÂs situation was just an odd mistake- something that rarely happens around there. I know there have been cases where a child has been cast in a role that was too big for them, too much responsibility. But I think thatÂs usually handled quietly, the director just finds a way to spread a little of the work around to some of the kids. I wanted to call Konnie and ask her about the situation (not to scold, I was just curious as to what had happened) but my daughter asked me not to as she didnÂt want to seem ÂfussyÂÂprobably good advice, too. </p>
<p>This is probably why most kids are given smaller parts their first few summers- I think that no matter how good the audition, I would be concerned about giving a large role to a child I had never worked with before.</p>
<p>Noracharles, your D sounds very mature and reasonable!</p>
<p>There is also the example of the girl that played cosette this summer, Supposidly she sang a belty song for her audition but they knew she was a high soprano so they cast her as cosette, which im sure she was very pleased with.</p>
<p>As far as parents complaining goes, kids usually arenât allowed to call home for a week partly for this reason. They want kids to adjust to camp life and to adjust to their show. Most parents do not call on behalf of their childrenâs parts. If any do I would wager that it is the parents of 1st year campers. Personally I donât believe that anyone should switch their show. You canât do it in the real world and you shouldnât be able to at stagedoor. It is important to remember that there are 3 people trying to fit nearly 300 kids into 13 shows in the course of a day and a half. It is not easy and mistakes will be made. I myself have been cast poorly for my abilities there and it was my second summer. But I did my best with the part and the show turned out great. I also know a girl who switched out of the ensemble of one show and into the ensemble of another show whose lead left and this girl got that part. So you never know what will happen. Another time, there was a boy who was cast wrong for a part and they gave it to someone else, but he had already done the part, so they ended up calling me up at home 4 days after I had left and they had me come back to do this part. It was crazy, but mistakes happen and we do what we can to fix them or live with them as best we can.</p>
<p>I have to say that I have never seen parents or kids complain openly to administration about their kids parts albeit how small. They do complain to each other at timesâŠi.e. my daughter has heard kids saying they were disappointed in the role they received, and parents saying it was disappointing that their kids didnât get a better role, but many fear complaining to admin because of future repercussions on their kidsâŠone parent did say that she mentioned something after the session was over, and the following year, her child was put in a play where she had nothing to say or singâŠjust dancing ensemble (which to her was worst than the first role she gently (her words) spoke to Konnie about). </p>
<p>My daughterâs roommate (2nd year the girl has come) was cast last year in AidaâŠthat is the show that wasnât allowed to be taped because of licensing problems so at the time, the kids werenât getting copies of the DVD. The parents were more than upset after paying all that money. But this girl was cast as 8th namibian slave or something like that so the parents told her that unless she got a more substantial role this year with a speaking part or song, she would not be allowed to come back and they wouldnât come to see her because it just wasnât worth it last year. They are lovely people, but felt horrified with the role and lack of dvdâŠluckily, this year she got a better part so all was well. </p>
<p>My daughterâs experience last year with Lucky Stiff was challenging in the sense that it was only her 2nd year at stagedoor, and she was 10 (but looked 13 and they thought she was older) so they gave her the lead. She had 225 lines, 3 solos, 3 duets plus the ensemble numbers, and I myself was impressed she could even fathom considering doing itâŠI was afraid it might not be able to handle it and then come out feeling she let the cast down. All went well initially and then the 2nd week, I got a call from admin saying suddenly my daughter didnât want to play the role anymore and could I speak to her as they just didnât know what was going on. She did share that she saw the original script where it called for her part and the lead boy to wake up in bed naked after a night of drinking! Apparently some of the older girls in other casts were saying some pretty nasty things (probably kidding around but she took it very seriously). She decided she couldnât do that and didnât want her family thinking she was a âbad girlâ. </p>
<p>Fortunately, they called to tell me that was NOT how the script was going to be played and were relieved because they didnât want to lose their leadâŠshe was doing such a great jobâŠit was bad enough she had to hug a guy. It was a comedy/mystery and still one of my favorite plays (it was one of the quieter Ahrens and Flaherty plays off-broadway with a limited run but hilarious - with kids in the roles, it was even funnier). Once it was explained that they would not be in a bed naked and just sitting on cubes with their clothes on, and the lines were not going to be what they were in the original script, then all was well. It was just the implication of impropriety that was eating at her. </p>
<p>Iâm thrilled she hung in there and that summer was one of her best ones up thereâŠShe was cast in a huge girl ensemble with a solo and duet and lots of trio dance numbers but nothing like last year. It was totally different and she welcomed the experience because she had never played a role like that before but who knows, maybe they thought after last year that she couldnât handle more, you never knowâŠbut she proved herself and then in her next session she had a supporting role. </p>
<p>I totally agree though that they will never take you from ensemble and give you a lead âŠif things hadnât worked out last year, they were going to switch her to a background ensemble role - take it or leave it - so that was a no brainer. </p>
<p>By the way Noracharles, my daughter desperately wanted to be in Anything Goes - she loved the music and play and is learning Anything Goes with her voice teacher now! </p>
<p>If you could only take one dance class, would it be tap, jazz or balletâŠwe have been doing it all over the years and included musical theater dance last year (which was disappointing where we took it) but this year, we just canât fit it in since school is getting tougher and our commute is a bear. Iâd like to keep one of them on schedule, do you all think it should be tap or jazz that would be most helpful? </p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>P.S. Courteney L"s daughter was featured in a lot of the songs in the show she was in (she was in my daughterâs show), wasnât the lead as she was younger than what the part required, but she did get a lot of duets and group. I felt she was treated just like the rest of the campers and she wanted it that wayâŠthey did have to speak to a camper about wearing a celebrity t-shirt so as not to offend any children of âartisticâ people who might be attending campâŠno one actually knew who they were referring to but the person compliedâŠthey might have made the announcement to only a select group.</p>
<p>I also agree that the people who do work professionally and are confident with themselves donât have the need to prove themselves in this settingâŠthere are a lot of those kids up thereâŠand Iâve never heard any of them saying âwell, Iâm this in the real world, etc.â I think perhaps they, as well as the celebrity children, might be looking for just a bit of normalcy in their livesâŠwhich is commendable. </p>
<p>There was a joke that one child of a certain celebrity couple came and didnât enjoy themselves and that they thought this was the parents way of punishing them and showing them how life would be like (i.e. the dorms, food) if they werenât famousâŠ</p>
<p>I think after being in a Stagedoor production sometimes the kids feel nothing is comparable back home unless it is regional theater. It is pretty darn amazing how they get such high caliber productions in 3 weeksâŠ</p>
<p>Yikes, did one camperâs parents <em>really</em> tell her that if she did not get a bigger role at SDM t year, they wouldnât pay for her to go to the camp? Whoa! What kind of a message is that to give to a kid? Am I in the minority in thinking that we send our kids to camp and to programs so they can learn and grow, and not because the parts they get (or donât get) are âworthâ the cost of the camp? The poor kid. Such a statement just reeks of âwe are disappointed in you and the role you got after we paid all of that money!â I am sure, too, that it is disappointing not to be able to get a DVD of a show, but is that really a deal breaker? I do enjoy the DVDs that we have of my Dâs past performances, but several of the shows she has been in do not allow DVDs for anything other than the theaterâs own, archival purposes, which I understand. Of course, in a camp setting, itâs different, I suppose.</p>
<p>Stars⊠regarding dance.
Generally (in my opinion), ballet instruction helps the most with posture (attitude), flexibility, and balance. Itâs techniques and terminology also serve as the basis for jazz, modern, and theater jazz. Someone with extensive ballet training will stand out. Also combinations will be easier for them to learn/remember. In the experience of my âkids,â tap is largely a different animal. Not saying ballet and jazz canât help a tap performance, but itâs roots are different.
Youâre d has had it all⊠So, where does she think she needs most growth? If itâs technique and balance, go for ballet. If she needs to loosen up a bit, maybe jazz. So far, my son has stayed competitive in tap, although heâs had least experience with that. I wonder whether chorus tap numbers tend to rely on less advanced skills.
Itâs really hard to figure out how to allocate limited time. My 15 y.o. daughter is constantly making these kinds of difficult decisions. Good luck.</p>
<p>Hi everyone:
There must have been a misunderstanding with the âAidaâ DVD because my D was in that show and we ordered and received a DVD. The audience members, if I remember right from a special letter the camp sent out to parents before the show, were not allowed to video-tape the show themselves which, I guess, they are normally allowed to do? (I donât take my own videos of the shows due to my lack of technical skills!!!) My husband, as well as other parents, did take non-flash photos of the âAidaâ show which was allowed, just not personal video-taping. She should still be able to get a copy of the show from Konnie, especially if she paid for it! I hope this info helps.</p>