KIM WILCOX | senior staff writer
photo | COURTESEY JEFF TIRRELL
Students praying over the new television stage on West Campus.


The completion of the West Campus sound stage and the Capstone Theater may provide for greater professional work from students.

TTwo red ribbons were the only things standing between the students of the Theater, Film and Television department and the newly added Black Box Capstone Theater and a television sound stage.

The ribbon cutting ceremony took place on Tuesday Sept 4. Many of the professors and students from the Theater, Film and Television department attended the ceremony, along with the Dean of the School of Liberal Arts and Sciences David Weeks, Associate Dean Donald Isaak and Associate Dean Melora Vandersluis.

Located to the right of the main stage theater, the Black Box Theater is the new home of the Senior Capstone Repertoire Company.

Senior theater majors are required to complete a capstone project in order to graduate. This requirement is similar to a vocal or instrumental music major’s senior recital requirement. For a theater student however, this means selecting and directing a play.

Assistant professor of acting Jill Lincoln is also a new addition to the Theater, Film and Television department this year. She was responsible for cutting the ribbon, which dedicated the new theater.

“A Black Box theater is meant for trying out new material. It is less presentational and more process oriented work,” Lincoln said.

There will be six shows appearing in the Black Box Theater alongside the nine main stage productions put on by the theater this year.
photo | COURTESEY JEFF TIRRELL
Michael Smith shown here cutting the ribbon at the new television sound stage.
Senior theater arts majors Andrea Aron and Jamie Criss agreed that the new theater was an exciting addition.

“It was always hard to coordinate times and to publicize the shows and let everybody know what was going on. Now [the seniors] get to be one unified people, supporting each other’s shows,” Aron said.

 Criss said her excitement was generated from thoughts of directing her own play, getting to have a creative vision, then seeing that vision through to completion.

If the Black Box Theater is for the creative expansion of the theater division, then the new television sound stage is for the creative expansion of the television division.

Senior cinema broadcast arts major Rob Bergsma said the new television sound stage would be home to APU’s famous Azusa Take-off series.

The show was previously taped in a classroom where students had to set up and tear down the lights and set pieces all in one day. With the grand opening of the new sound stage the students will be able to have their own facilities where they can move the equipment around.

This year a new faculty member, professor Michael Smith, will direct the show. Smith said the students in the Azusa Take-off class have begun to show him how everything is done. He said they were all excited and students have begun choosing their topics for the three shows this semester.

“The sound stage will act as both a taping studio and a classroom,” Dr. Warren Koch of the Theater, Film and Television department said. “It will be a great room that allows for better live television tapings with less hassle.”

Weeks, Isaak and Vadnersluis showed their support by helping the professors cut the ribbon and by praying over each of the additions throughout the ceremony.

Assistant professor Lincoln christened the new theater with these words: “May this new theater be a place where we find great truth.”