ARTS; For Teenagers, Lessons in Drama and Finance
FOR a group of teenagers at the Northern Westchester Center for the Arts here, theater means more than bright lights and warm applause. It means more than colorful costumes and drop-dead sets or good scripts and fine acting.
For the members of the Eclipse Theater Company, which is in its debut season at the center's Colleen Dewhurst Theater, theater is also about budgeting, fund-raising and ticket sales. Most important, it is about making the right decisions, so the show can go on.
College arts conservatories have begun teaching students the ways of the business world, but Paul Andrew Perez, the Mount Kisco center's theater director, has beaten those more-advanced programs to the punch. He is nurturing a company of 10 young actors, directors and writers ages of 13 to 18, teaching them not only drama technique but also theater finance as well. After giving them two years of after-school conservatory training, he recently handed them the reins to the company.
That is how Elizabeth Kerin, a 17-year-old senior at Wilton High School in Wilton, Conn., came to be Eclipse's artistic director. She was elected by the company, which votes democratically on all its decisions. Ms. Kerin is a singer, actress, composer and playwright who aspires to a career writing stage musicals. She also is responsible for seeing that Eclipse stays solvent, attracts an audience and sails into its second season, when she plans to be in college.
''It's a very big responsibility, but I really enjoy it,'' she said. ''It's a taste of what it will be like to work in professional theater.''
Mr. Perez, an actor, writer, director and producer with Off Broadway experience, said that the fledgling company was working toward a budget of $15,000 for production essentials like sets and lights, and for marketing costs like brochures and mailings. This season the company raised $11,000 for three productions: ''Godspell,'' last November; ''An Evening of David Ives,'' consisting of eight one-act plays by the contemporary playwright, to be presented this Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 and 7 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m.; and ''R & J, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet'' on June 18, 19 and 20. To raise money, members washed cars, sold baked goods and candy at the center's shows, requested donations from corporations and sold program advertisements.
Once they graduate to the company, the teenagers take a two-hour class once a week in voice training, stage combat and physical movement, for which they pay $774 a year; there is no additional cost for company membership.
Alan Reingold, head of the center's art department, helps the students with scenic design, while James Gerth, the Dewhurst's technical director, advises them on technical matters. Mr. Perez said he brought in professional stage directors this year, but hopes eventually to turn all the directing over to the young people.
He said he suggested the evening of Ives plays because of their irreverence and offbeat humor. The next production is also his idea -- a twist on the classic Romeo and Juliet story in which the female characters become men and vice versa. For example, Juliet is called Julian and Romeo is Roma, but otherwise Shakespeare's language is virtually unchanged, he said.
Eclipse members came up with their own programs for next year, beginning with the musical ''Bat Boy'' and ending with ''Metamorphosis.'' In between they will stage an evening of plays by Stephen Fruchtman, a 2003 graduate of New Rochelle High School who is a freshman at New York University. As they try out their wings, the teenagers say they feel secure with Mr. Perez standing by. Chantel Pascente, the artistic director-elect, said that the training had showed her she could play more than ''quirky'' comedy characters. ''I've always been energetic on stage, but didn't know how to use it,'' she said. ''I feel like now I'm a fine-crafted actress.''
Mr. Perez said such skills were only a beginning.
''It's important as artists these days to know how to produce yourself,'' he said. ''I don't baby them. This is a safe environment to make mistakes.''
Tickets for all Eclipse's performances are $12. Information: (914)241-6922.
