Where can a young person go to strengthen their confidence and leadership skills, become creative thinkers, live up to their true potential and maybe even learn how to improvise?
Veteran actor, acting teacher and writer Kristen Dabrowski believes her new Spotlight School of Drama can help instill all of these qualities and more in young people ages 8 to 18. Recently opened in West Windsor, the school was founded with the mission to fire up the imagination of its charges and set them on a path of joyful exploration, but also to help them become proficient in problem solving and other more adult abilities.
Dabrowski, founder and artistic director of the school says, “Spotlight provides a creative, participatory, social, thought-provoking alternative to video games, TV, text messaging, and net surfing. I’m on a mission to build thinkers who are willing to take risks, make decisions, and express themselves.”
With years of studies and acting experience in venerable institutions like Oxford School of Drama and Trinity College in the U.K., American Academy of Dramatic Arts and the Actors Institute in New York and McCarter Theater in Princeton, Dabrowski brings a variety of acting techniques to share with the students. She names legendary actors such as Fiona Shaw, Juliet Stevenson and Prunella Scales as just a few of her teachers.
In addition, as the author of 24 nationally and internationally published theatrical books, her skills as writer and teacher give an extra dimension and depth to the program.
“I know a great number of acting techniques, but I’m also good at getting kids to think,” Dabrowski says. “I do it in a fun and active way so they don’t even know they’re learning. Of course there are ethics issues and educational components, but it’s not didactic. I’m not lecturing to them, they think for themselves.
“I realized I had worked and studied with a great number of people, and so I wanted to take all this information I’ve soaked up and teacher others,” she adds. “I’ve worked at conservatories and theater schools and often they’ll have specific curriculum and they want me to stick with it. But with Spotlight, there was an opportunity for me to do my own thing, which is very exciting.”
Classes at Spotlight include studies in improvisation, audition technique, scene study, play and screenwriting, classical theatre, voice and movement, dialects, comedy, and musical theater. Among additional offerings will be monthly workshop intensives and special theme events such as Teen Nights and Middle School Madness parties. Fees start at $65 for a workshop or a performance party. Some sessions conclude with a production. Full details are on the website,and Dabrowski is offering a free sample class.
“The workshops and parties are ways to learn new skills and socialize in a non-academic setting,” Dabrowski says.
Combining her writing skills with small-sized classes will allow the students to be literally in the spotlight. Dabrowski writes her own shows which helps her to personalize and create roles for each child.
“I want to keep the classes small so I can cater to the students, so I’ll know what they want and what they need,” she says. “Also, when I create a play, I’ll shape it so the message and story line is more realistic. A lot of plays for kids have very obvious messages and they really spell them out, too much so. Instead, I like to have things not work out, impart the idea that sometimes people don’t make the best decisions, they get in trouble. This way I’m really making them think. I want students to explore their beliefs.”
A native of Hamilton Township, Dabrowski was living in Manhattan until just recently. Teaching is probably in her blood, since her father, Walter Dabrowski, is a veteran educator, currently teaching history at Mercer County Community College. Her mother, Louise, ran the former Sterling Personnel employment agency for years. (She is now retired.)
Dabrowski attended Stuart Country Day School in Princeton, and got her bachelor’s degree in 1992 from Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. It was during her last semester at F&M that she fell in love with England.
“I went there during my last year of college and just loved it,” Dabrowski says. “It’s an amazing place for theater, with so many terrific actors. I just wanted to soak everything up.” After college, she worked at Princeton University Press, where she was a book jacket editor, working with copy and design and arranging for heavy hitters to write blurbs for the new publications.
“I had the strangest Rolodex, filled with numbers for people like Norman Mailer, Stephen Hawking and Mikhail Gorbachev,” Dabrowski says. She also taught at Montclair State University, as well as McCarter and Off-Broadstreet Theatre in Hopewell. Meanwhile, Dabrowski was also writing, publishing her theater books with Smith & Kraus (www.smithandkraus.com). Her works include nine books for elementary students, six for middle school students, eight for high school/college students, and one full-length play for adults.
A member of Actors Equity Association and the Dramatists Guild, she has performed in numerous productions in the U.S. and U.K., and has a variety of classical roles to her credit, such as Ophelia in “Hamlet” and Miranda in “The Tempest.” She is no stranger to directing either, and has created and directed an assortment of musicals performed in New York City.
Dabrowski returned to England in the late 1990s and earned a master’s degree from the Oxford School of Drama in 2000. Back in the United States, she taught in an assortment of private and public schools, mostly in New York City.
It’s obvious that Dabrowski has a sense of humor. Among the musicals she created was one titled “The Donner Party (Wasn’t Fun).” Here’s another way she hopes to get students excited about learning: by bringing history and literature alive through her plays.
“I take serious historical or literary works and turn them on their heads,” Dabrowski says. “Kids become interested in something they otherwise might think boring. For example, ‘Beowolf’ is not everybody’s favorite work, but approached in this lighthearted way, kids have a wonderful time.”
By the way parents, you will enjoy the plays, too. “They’ll get things at different levels, but they’re fun to watch for kids and adults,” Dabrowski says.
Considering where to base the Spotlight School, she chose West Windsor “because this area has a reputation for having excellent, curious students,” Dabrowski says. “The area and the surrounding towns are growing, and parents are culturally aware. It feels like the ideal time to launch a creatively based project like this, especially as schools are often being pressured to save money by reducing arts programming.”
It seems unlikely that the confident, articulate 38-year old Dabrowski was ever timid, but she admits to being a shy child and remembers what it was like to be fearful. That’s a big reason why she wants to help give kids’ self-esteem a boost through theater.
“I’ll create a safe environment that’s free of judgment and even kids who aren’t immediately drawn to acting will have a good time,” she says. “They’ll be proud of what they’ve created. I worked in schools in New York and some of them were in pretty tough areas. Even there, the kids were delighted to see what they had done. They’d get so excited, they literally stood up and cheered.”
Spotlight School of Drama, 1300 Windsor Road, West Windsor; 609-228-3069. www.spotlightdrama.com WW-P News readers are invited to call to reserve a space for a free sample class.
