The youth scene

At the Summer Youth Conservatory, the students aren’t just playing. They’re performing.

Laughing and singing, playing silly games and talking in British accents are part of any summer camp experience, but here it’s in the curriculum.

Instead of going to camp or lounging at home this summer, students ages 10 to 18 are coming to the Center for Dramatic Arts to develop their acting and technical theater skills, as well as to build their resume.

“Once I came here, I realized that this could be a great opportunity to do something other than sit on the couch and watch TV all summer,” said Alexandra Finazzo, 16, of East Chapel Hill High.

This summer the cast of young actors and their behind-the-scenes counterparts are working on “Drood,” a musical within a musical based on a novel by Charles Dickens.

The play offers opportunities for audience participation. Each night, the audience will vote on the ending they want to see.

“The audience is probably going to be different every night, so you never know their energies and what they’re going to want,” said Ardyn Flynt, 13, of A.L. Stanback Middle School in Hillsborough.

For its fourth year, the partnership between PlayMakers Repertory Company and the ArtsCenter in Carrboro has gathered 47 students for the summer.

As a member of the conservatory since it began, 16-year-old Northwood High School student Henry Stokes, of Pittsboro, said this year will exceed previous performances.

“We’ve upped the ante,” Stokes said. “We’re doing this show, which may be two hours, but we have maybe four hours of material to rehearse because there are so many alternate endings. Having that unpredictability will be really exciting.”

The conservatory also offers opportunities out of the spotlight. The TheatreTech program has 12 students learning the inner workings of the theater and stage management.

Jonathan Chamberlin, 18, who will attend Beloit College in Wisconsin this fall, is an actor turned lighting designer.

“I moved into doing backstage work and fell in love with it,” Chamberlin said. “I didn’t necessarily like jumping on stage. I just liked feeling like part of the greater theater family, which you don’t lose being offstage.”

Chamberlin said the program helped him choose his career and narrow his college choices because it opened him to the idea of a life in theater.

“I never seriously considered theater in a professional atmosphere because I really didn’t know anything about professional theater,” he said. “My idea of professional theater was starving in New York.”

Louisa Jackson-Young, 16, of Texas, is another actor who decided to take a step backstage this summer.

“I came because I really wanted to know all parts of the theater, not just the on-stage stuff, and appreciate the tech people more,” said Jackson-Young. “Without them there wouldn’t be a show.”

The students will also be performing a showcase on July 14, featuring different scenes of comedic interactions.

Monty Python’s “Dead Parrot,” “Say Goodnight, Gracie” and “Swan Lake” were inspirations for some of the scenes, while others were created in the classroom.

“Acting skills transfer from genre to genre, from piece to piece,” said Kathy Williams, an acting teacher at the conservatory and member of PlayMakers Repertory Company.

But the hope is that the students take what they learn in their acting classes and use it in their rehearsals, she said.

“Our goal is to give the kids the experience of working in a professional atmosphere, which includes a big-budget production, with sets, lighting and costumes just like a real PlayMakers show,” said Jeri Lynn Schulke, director of the conservatory.