The Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport formally opened the National Theatre Art School on Tuesday evening to great fanfare.
Minister Dr Frank Anthony said the opening was a proud moment as the ministry had long envisioned establishing the school.
“We said if we want to develop a renaissance in music then we should look and see how we can develop music in our country, and we started out with our music school, the music school is already doing things that are making us proud,” he said, according to a Government Information Agency (GINA) report.
Two batches of students have already undertaken the Royal Academy of Music exams and have passed, some with distinctions. The Theatre Art School will open for classes next Monday with 18 students. It offers a diploma programme after two years of tutoring. During the first year students will be required to take all the courses offered, at the end of which they will be awarded a certificate. In the second year they will select a subject for their major and minor course of study, at the end of which they will be given a diploma which will later allow them to secure an associate degree in theatre arts.
The ministry decided to establish a theatre school as it was believed that having a dance school and music school would put those interested in theatre at a disadvantage. “Through the National Drama Festival we realised that a lot of people are interested in drama in our country and we feel that the role of the school is helping them to polish up those skills. The school will help persons with their performances and look at the technical side of theatre because we want to utilise the facilities here at the (National) Cultural Centre to do lighting on stage and stage management and sounds and special courses to deal with designs, wardrobe and so on to enhance what we are doing,” Anthony said.
Ultimately it is intended that these schools would be brought under one umbrella body on the establishment of an Institute of Creative Arts at the Cultural Centre. “When we analyse what we are doing here at the Cultural Centre,(since the centre started a lot of people were renting the space), we have and we thought of putting to use the space here so having the theatre arts school here, we felt that it would give another important function to the space.,” the minister said. Anthony also revealed plans to open a café later this year where artists can put on displays; further utilising the space at the NCC.
Director of Drama, Collette Jones-Chin said the creative arts are at the core of the cultural psyche of a people, reflecting an individual’s growth spiritually, intellectually, emotionally and socially. In giving an overview of the programme, she said the courses on offer are acting, voice, movement, English Language and Literature, lights, sounds, directing and the history of theatre, script writing, and costume and creativeness, makeup for theatre, business of theatre, introduction to theatre and set designs and stage craft and management.
Meanwhile, Secretary to the Guyana Prize for Literature Management Committee, Professor Al Creighton, who gave a brief history on theatre, said that the opening of the school is very significant as it will bring together drama and training.
“It is a replay of history where these two activities are concerned…from the earlier stages in the development of theatre and drama there are some instructive parallels”, he said.
The first theatre was opened in Guyana in 1810. One of the first productions was done on February 24, 1810.
