Classes, Workshops & Events
Jo Dodge 2024 Spring Acting Workshop
Begins Saturday, March 23, 2024
Join skilled director and actress Jo Dodge in a fun, hands-on 11-week theater workshop exploring the human spirit. Students participate in improvisation and scene work in a safe, supportive and non-competitive environment. The focus is on individual self-development. This workshop is for all skill levels, from beginners to the most experienced. You must be 18 yrs. of age to attend these classes. The course runs every Saturday for 11 weeks from 9 a.m. to Noon. Spring Session begins Saturday, March 23, 2024. Find greater confidence in yourself on and off the stage!
The following are excerpts from Pentacle’s July 26, 2022 Newsletter
Jo created the Acting Workshop in 1981. She has trained and inspired, by conservative estimate, over 2,000 students. Her impact there has been profound, enhancing the lives of her individual students and growing the theater’s cadre of actors and directors. The number of shows, students and contributions tell only a small part of the story.
Jo’s most important gift lies in the intangibles. She helps us expand our sense of our collective humanity and the variety of the human condition. She does this by producing moving theater. She directs with insight and clarity, finding the subtext and human truth for each character on stage, which she also teaches in this Acting Workshop.
Jo insists that her students collaborate not compete. She makes the class a place of trust and growth. She helps her students act by finding the truth not relying on the gimmick and in so doing they discover truths about themselves. She insists they learn the script word for word, without paraphrasing. Most importantly she helps her students learn that most fundamental aspect of human connection, to trust and support each other.
Register for the Spring 2024 workshop here:
Boxing & Brawling – Unarmed Stage Combat Techniques for Beginners
Saturday, April 13, 2024
This 2-hour class is perfect opportunity for beginner and returning students to learn basic unarmed stage combat techniques such as punches, blocks & dodges, elbows, knees, and more.
All students will learn useful techniques to safely and effectively show unarmed violence on stage, but also have the opportunity to learn a small choreographed fight to record to show off to their friends and family.
Whether you have taken a class with The Pen & Sword before or not, com have fun with us! All are welcome: actors, directors, stage managers, techies, and the curious.
Register for the Boxing & Brawling workshop here:
The Director’s Forum Presents – Blocking for the Thrust Stage
1 p.m. Saturday, April 20
On stage at Pentacle Theatre
324 52nd Ave NE, Salem OR 97304
Veteran Pentacle directors Katie Lindbeck and Jenni Bertels will explore blocking for the thrust stage. Covering function and history as well as how movement establishes character relationships, focus and stage pictures, scene changes, and dynamics of confrontation will be the focus areas.
Register for Blocking for the Thrust Stage workshop here:
Pentacle Theatre Costume Sale
10 a.m. – 4 p.m. Saturday, April 27
Pentacle Theatre
324 52nd Ave NE, Salem OR 97304
Pentacle’s costume vault needs more room! We’ve been gleaning costumes from more than three decades of past productions and those treasures are now ready for you to enjoy.
Come find your next Treasure(s) — you will not go home empty-handed!