Joining the Innovative Arts cast is a big step, especially for students who have never done a musical before. We want to ensure all our young performers have an incredible first experience, so here are a few tips that will ensure your family is yelling “Bravo!” about your Innovator’s inaugural season.
1. Help Your Innovator Get Organized
The most important first step is helping your Innovator organize their script and score (sheet music), and showing them how to make the most of the Innovative Arts App.
2. Get to Know the Team
The more of a relationship our directors and creative team have with you, the more immersed you and your Innovator will become in our loving (and totally crazy) theatre family! So, please feel free to come at the end of a rehearsal (not the beginning as we are busy preparing at drop-off) and introduce yourself to your performer’s cast director and creative team. This will help you know who to go to when you have a question about costumes, or to let us know if your child will be absent from rehearsal or even if you just want ideas on what show to go see next as a family. Plus, it will help you get in on the fun. You will likely hear inside jokes and names like “Christina’s Peanuts”, “Nick’s Bricks” and “The Golden Bebe’s” thrown around on the car ride home, so the better you know us, the more connected you will be with it all. We also understand that students want different things from this experience--some are doing it to have fun with their friends, some as a hobby, some because it’s their passion and some want to pursue it as a career—so letting us know the reason your child is doing theatre with us will help us give them more of the experience they want. We love when parents introduce themselves and stay connected with us because it allows us to work together as a team to ensure your Innovator is getting exactly what they want out of our program.
3. Car Conversations: Checking In With Your Innovator
Each week, your Innovator works with at least four different teachers and is constantly learning new things about technique, songs, scene work and choreography, so when they jump in the car and reply to your questions about rehearsal with one-word answers like “good”, “yea”, “nothing” or “maybe” you can be assured that there is so much you can chat with them about! Ask them which teachers they worked with that night, what songs or dances they learned, what cast mates they connected with the most and if there were any announcements you need to know about. If you still don’t feel like you’re getting the run down from your Innovator in the car, you can always email, phone or chat with us after rehearsal or during the week about how your son or daughter is doing. We love to brag about how much they are improving, let you know what they may be struggling with and work together with you on a plan that will help achieve their personal goals.
4. Read the Email Updates
This can be the most challenging one, but it is also the most rewarding! Every week we send out an email update with three points of information. These three points are what you need to know the most that week. We do our best to keep them concise so that we aren’t overwhelming you with anything that isn’t related to you and your Innovative student. Five minutes per week will ensure you stay in the know about off-book dates, Bring-a-Friend Day, auditions, theatre schedules, costumes, make-up and more.
5. A Final Helpful Hint: Get Your Costume Basics Sooner Rather than Later!
The one thing we hear Innovative parents advising each other on the most is the Costume Basics. Three weeks before your Innovator’s dress rehearsal, we will send information about the clothes they need to wear under their costumes as well as what kind of show shoes they need. These items, which includes things like tank tops, running shorts, and character shoes, are better purchased sooner rather than later. We hear so many parents reprimanding themselves for waiting until the last minute to purchase their student’s Costume Basics, that we knew this had to be one of the tips to include for those who are doing this for the first time!
We sincerely hope this helps you and your Innovator prepare for your inaugural season with us! We are here to help and support you however we can in the wild and crazy journey of having a “theatre kid”, so make sure to introduce yourself to us, download the IA app, watch for the weekly emails, and get ready to enjoy the show!
1. Help Your Innovator Get Organized
The most important first step is helping your Innovator organize their script and score (sheet music), and showing them how to make the most of the Innovative Arts App.
- Read the Script Together to understand the story and the part each of the characters plays in it.
- Highlight their spoken and vocal lines as well as their staging notes. Remember, there are important details in the stage directions that will help them better understand their place in the show and on the stage, so make sure that, in addition to their lines, they also highlight any stage information that relates to their character.
- Design & Decorate If you want to go even further, you can help them put sticky notes on all of their scenes and songs and encourage them to decorate their script and binder to make it special to them (and harder to lose at rehearsals!)
- Use the App to access and download the vocal tracks and instrumentals to their phone or iPad and create a playlist for the car and start listening. If they can immerse themselves in the material, it will be easier to pick up the songs at rehearsals and then they can focus on their character and the acting, instead of trying to memorize lyrics, melodies, harmonies and lines. We also recommend that our students practice with the instrumental tracks instead of the Broadway recordings. The Broadway version is provided for reference, but these vocal tracks are often times slightly different than what we use in our shows. Also, we want to promote individuality and creativity in each of our performers and encourage them to create their own sound instead of mimicking another actor’s so they can grow as a performer.
2. Get to Know the Team
The more of a relationship our directors and creative team have with you, the more immersed you and your Innovator will become in our loving (and totally crazy) theatre family! So, please feel free to come at the end of a rehearsal (not the beginning as we are busy preparing at drop-off) and introduce yourself to your performer’s cast director and creative team. This will help you know who to go to when you have a question about costumes, or to let us know if your child will be absent from rehearsal or even if you just want ideas on what show to go see next as a family. Plus, it will help you get in on the fun. You will likely hear inside jokes and names like “Christina’s Peanuts”, “Nick’s Bricks” and “The Golden Bebe’s” thrown around on the car ride home, so the better you know us, the more connected you will be with it all. We also understand that students want different things from this experience--some are doing it to have fun with their friends, some as a hobby, some because it’s their passion and some want to pursue it as a career—so letting us know the reason your child is doing theatre with us will help us give them more of the experience they want. We love when parents introduce themselves and stay connected with us because it allows us to work together as a team to ensure your Innovator is getting exactly what they want out of our program.
3. Car Conversations: Checking In With Your Innovator
Each week, your Innovator works with at least four different teachers and is constantly learning new things about technique, songs, scene work and choreography, so when they jump in the car and reply to your questions about rehearsal with one-word answers like “good”, “yea”, “nothing” or “maybe” you can be assured that there is so much you can chat with them about! Ask them which teachers they worked with that night, what songs or dances they learned, what cast mates they connected with the most and if there were any announcements you need to know about. If you still don’t feel like you’re getting the run down from your Innovator in the car, you can always email, phone or chat with us after rehearsal or during the week about how your son or daughter is doing. We love to brag about how much they are improving, let you know what they may be struggling with and work together with you on a plan that will help achieve their personal goals.
4. Read the Email Updates
This can be the most challenging one, but it is also the most rewarding! Every week we send out an email update with three points of information. These three points are what you need to know the most that week. We do our best to keep them concise so that we aren’t overwhelming you with anything that isn’t related to you and your Innovative student. Five minutes per week will ensure you stay in the know about off-book dates, Bring-a-Friend Day, auditions, theatre schedules, costumes, make-up and more.
5. A Final Helpful Hint: Get Your Costume Basics Sooner Rather than Later!
The one thing we hear Innovative parents advising each other on the most is the Costume Basics. Three weeks before your Innovator’s dress rehearsal, we will send information about the clothes they need to wear under their costumes as well as what kind of show shoes they need. These items, which includes things like tank tops, running shorts, and character shoes, are better purchased sooner rather than later. We hear so many parents reprimanding themselves for waiting until the last minute to purchase their student’s Costume Basics, that we knew this had to be one of the tips to include for those who are doing this for the first time!
We sincerely hope this helps you and your Innovator prepare for your inaugural season with us! We are here to help and support you however we can in the wild and crazy journey of having a “theatre kid”, so make sure to introduce yourself to us, download the IA app, watch for the weekly emails, and get ready to enjoy the show!