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| Where every Kidz' A Star! | Training the Starz of Tomorrow! | Theatre With a BROAD Perspective! |
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ShowBiz Kidz is a theatrical training program for children ages four to twelve. It was founded in February 1997 by Carol-Ann Black to expose children from all social and economic backgrounds to the performing arts. ShowBiz Kidz or SBK (as the students have affectionately dubbed it) started working out of the Wyandotte Movie Theatre with rehearsals on Saturday mornings, when the movie theatre was dark. Our first show was “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and the cast was also responsible for serving on a technical committee choosing from Props, Sets or Costumes. Our next show was “The Little Mermaid” featuring a cast of undersea creatures. During “Alice In Wonderland”, the Wyandotte Theatre was foreclosed on and we were lucky enough to rehearse at the First Presbyterian Church of Wyandotte and to perform at Taylor Center High School. The City of Taylor Parks and Recreation offered us a new home and we presented our first Beginning Acting and Intermediate Acting classes during our 1998 summer session. “Li’l Abner” was our next offering and then we lost Taylor Center High School due to asbestos removal. Fortunately, the Wyandotte Theatre had been bought to be refurbished and used as a regional performing arts center and our next production, “Faery Tale Theatre: The Twelve Dancing Princesses and The Spell of Sleeping Beauty” featured our first split cast with youngsters ages four to twelve the first act and teenagers thirteen to eighteen in the second act.
We were approached by Riverview Recreation to teach acting classes after one of the Recreation directors saw our production of “Faery Tale Theatre”. That was when ShowBiz Kidz started offering a tri-level program of Beginning Acting, Intermediate Acting and Play Production. Students needed to complete both Beginning and Intermediate Acting before they could take part in the play productions, thus ensuring that every student had the same basic skill set before appearing in a full length play or musical. Beginning Acting taught the basics of acting through the study of scenes from plays based on classic children’s stories and fairy tales. Intermediate Acting delved into characterization and script analysis by exploring monologues from a broad spectrum of plays that represent both modern and classical time periods. Both classes combined at the end of each term in a public recital that showcased what the students have been diligently working on during the eight-week term. Recitals usually offered some form of dinner or buffet with the performance. Past recitals included a “Mad Hatter’s Tea Party” with tea, punch, finger sandwiches, cakes and cookies and “The Tooth Fairy’s Worst Nightmare” featuring an all-you-can-eat dessert buffet with coffee or punch.
While in rehearsals for “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and “School House Rock Live Junior!”, the Wyandotte Theatre regional arts center ran out of money and we were once again left without a performance space. Riverview Recreation was approached to see if they would sponsor not only our acting classes, but our play productions as well. We performed out of Seitz Middle School and did recitals at the Riverview Community Center for the next five years. We performed some of our most popular shows during this very productive period including “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, “School House Rock Live Junior!”, “The Phantom Tollbooth”, “Into The Woods Junior” (1999 & 2001), “Faery Tale Theatre 2: The Emperor’s New Clothes and Beauty and the Beast”, “Rosemary for Remembrance”, “Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella”, “Bugsy Malone Junior”, “How To Eat Like A Child And Other Lessons In Not Being A Grown-Up”, “Charlotte’s Web”, “On Time”, “Faery Tale Theatre 3: Rapunzel” and “Pocahontas”.
During this time we also received some awards and accolades: ShowBiz Kidz 1999/2000 season was recognized by Riverview Mayor Tim Durand, the Riverview City Council and Barbara Hammerle, Recreation Director, with a special Certificate of Achievement, our cast of “Cinderella” waltz and sang their way through 90o heat during the City of Wyandotte’s 2000 Fourth of July Parade to earn the “Best In Show” trophy and a $250 check and our Artistic Director, Carol-Ann Black, was named YWCA’s 2000 Woman of Achievement in Arts/Communication and received her award at a luncheon with special guest, anchorwoman Monica Gayle.
Lincoln Park Parks and Recreation became our next home. We continued to offer our acting classes and introduced our summer workshop program. We debuted our family dinner theatre series with “BOO! Thirteen Scenes From Halloween” (which included an audience costume contest complete with prizes and a walk-through haunted house on the upper level of the Community Center during intermission) and the family classic, “Pollyanna”. Due to limited facility usage at Lincoln Park, it was decided to part ways and we performed “Faery Tale Theatre 4: The Twelve Dancing Princesses and The Spell of Sleeping Beauty” and “The Adventures of Doctor Dolittle” at Jo Brighton Skills Center while renting rehearsal space from Rockwood Recreation Department and Wayne County Community College. Our summer performing arts program, Camp ShowBiz, was launched the summer of 2006 at Rockwood Community Center.
Angela Romanowski, principal of Trillium Academy, saw our production of “The Adventures of Doctor Dolittle” and invited us to work in partnership with her school at their brand new facility on Racho Road in Taylor. Thus our business partnership with Trillium Academy was born! Every year we co-produce “The Haunted Theatre” with the Trillium Academy Drama Club to raise funds for the Royal Majestic Theatre Building Improvement Fund. This venture has allowed us to purchase lighting equipment that was permanently installed in the theatre. We offer a special discount program to the staff, students and families of Trillium Academy to attend any production mounted at the Royal Majestic Theatre. During the summer of 2007, reconstruction has been done on the theatre to include bigger dressing rooms, theatre storage and a brand-new box office!
It was decided in 2006 to drop the acting class requirements and let any child with a curiosity about theatre to become involved in our live stage productions, regardless of experience. Every student enrolled is guaranteed a part in the play and we live up to our motto, “Where every kidz’ a Star!” by ensuring each cast member is given their turn in the spotlight. Our productions at Trillium Academy have included the disco-dancing fairy tale “Puss In Boots”, the audience-pleasing “Disney’s Jungle Book for Kids”, “The Wizard of Oz (RSC version)”, “Pocahontas”, “Beauty and the Beast”, the gangster musical, “Bugsy Malone Junior”, “Honk Jr.”, “Charlotte’s Web”, “A Pocketful of Rhymes”, “Disney’s Mulan Jr.”, “School House Rock Live Jr.”, “Thumbelina”, “The Adventures of Doctor Dolittle,” “Disney’s The AristoCats Kids,” "Sheherazade," "High School Musical Jr" and "Disney's 101 Dalmatians."
ShowBiz Kidz runs year-round and typically does three productions per year: two musicals and a straight play. Auditions are held the first week after an intensive Audition Workshop where each student is prepared for the audition with monologues and/or scenes and taught song and dance combinations, if it is a musical. Emphasis is given to scripts that offer a wide variety of parts and a chance to put each student’s unique talent to good use.
For more information on upcoming auditions, please see our Auditions page.
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Under Construction
Please visist our Past Seasons page here.
Carol-Ann Black (Artistic Director) holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Theatre/Dance from Alma College. She is currently the Artistic Director for ShowBiz Kidz and ShowBiz Starz, two theatrical training programs she founded in 1997 for children ages four to twelve and teens ages thirteen to eighteen. In 2001, she launched Big Girl Productions, her own adult performance company, and appeared as Marmee March in their debut production of "Little Women". As an actress, she has appeared in regional theatre, dinner theatre, summer stock, childrens' theatre and toured the nation as Alma Hix in the 35th Anniversary tour of "The Music Man". Carol-Ann was the proud recipient of the 2000 YWCA Woman of Achievement Award in Arts/Communications. Ms. Black's local credits include Wild Swan Theatre, Detroit Women's Shakespeare Project, R. Diehl Productions, Jacksonn Productions and The Actor's Company. Carol-Ann has also directed for Southgate Community Players, Wyandotte Community Theatre, Trenton Community Theatre, Grosse Ile Islanders, Jacksonn Productions, Westland All-Stars, St. Pius Elementary School Drama Club and Allen Park Middle School Drama Club. She has been a theatrical instructor for the Montessori Children's Center in Allen Park, Lincoln Park School District Title One Drama Program, Sherry's Academy of Dance, DYPAC 2004 Summer Fine Arts Camp, Starfish Family Services and taught improvisation to developmentally disabled teens at Josephine Brighton Living Skills Center and Lincoln Center Satellite Program at Wilson Middle School, both in Wyandotte.
Laurin Tuxbury (Co-Choreographer/Dance Captain) is super excited to be working with ShowBiz Kidz again! Laurin has been involved with ShowBiz for the past seven years, but has taken a brief hiatus to study social work at Sienna Heights University. She has been dancing for fifteen years and held the title of ShowBiz Dance Captain for four years. Laurin graduates from Sienna Heights University in December and intends on pursuing her Masters of Social Work at the University of Michigan.
Jen Nagle (Assistant Director, Costumer, Webmistress) is a certified teacher glad to join the staff. She graduated from Alma College in 2005 with a degree in Theatre and Dance and earned a Certification in Secondary Education from Central Michigan University in 2008 with endorsements in English and History. Highlights of her theatrical experience include appearing in A Midsummer Night's Dream twice, once for Alma College as the fairy Moth in 2002 and again with Big Girl Productions as Robin Goodfellow, aka Puck in 2010, being a perrenial member of the Costuming Crew at Alma, directing You Can't Trust the Male at the Alma College One-Act Festival of 2004, Stage Managing a few times, and designing costumes for several One Act Festivals, teaching Theatre Crafts for a year at a charter school (before being laid off), then taking the stage again with Big Girl in Midsummer, designing costumes and playing Lizzie Bennet in Pride & Prejudice, designing costumes and playing the Mock Turtle in Alice in Wonderland, Assistant Directing and coaching dialects for Wind in the Willows -- and is looking forward to seeing where things go from there!
Krystal Fitch (Hair & Makeup Designer) is a licensed cosmetologist and is a recent addition to the staff. Krystal studied art at Alma College and Cosmetology at David Pressley in Taylor. She has been acting in the group since 2000 but took a short hiatus while going to college and starting a family. She is very excited to be involved in the visual aspect of the shows!
Lynn Tate (Box Office Coordinator aka 'Tikkit Lady") A familiar face to those frequenting ShowBiz and Big Girl experiences, she has been a loyal fixture of the program. She would like to remind you to reserve your tickets ahead of time to ensure your place!
Liza Boos (Vocal Director)
Teri Howell (Costumer)
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