The Junior Theater Festival (JTF) is the world’s biggest and best celebration of young people performing musical theater.
JTF brings together student musical theater troupes from all over the world for a weekend of musical theater mayhem and madness. Each troupe performs fifteen minutes from a Broadway Junior®️ show for adjudication by a panel of musical theater experts. The weekend also features professional development for teachers, workshops for students and parents, a New Works Showcase featuring new musical adaptations soon to be released and concludes with a grand finale concert headlined by Broadway’s best! CAPA typically attends the Atlanta festival over MLK weekend. In the future, we may shift to attending this festival every 2nd or 3rd year. We believe all should try to attend once prior to graduating high school when they are no longer eligible to participate.
CAPA
Junior Theatre Festival "JTF"
Local Theater Group Brings Home National Honors from iTheatrics
National Junior Theater Festival in Houston, Texas
Southwestern Wake County’s award-winning youth theater program, Carolina Academy of Performing Arts (CAPA), brought home additional national awards and honors from the 2021 ITheatrics National Junior Theater Festival (JTF) held from June 25-27, 2021, in Houston, Texas. JTF is the world’s biggest celebration of young people who perform musical theater.
Under the direction of Artistic Director Melanie Prince, The CAPA JTF ensemble, consisting of local youth ages 7-18, performed a 15-minute cut from Into the Woods, Jr. in adjudicated performance. Out of 50 ensembles representing 19 states, the CAPA ensemble brought home a National Excellence in Acting trophy. Ensemble member, 9-year-old Cameron Lewis, brought home a national award for Outstanding Performance by an Individual (All Festival). Festival All Star honors were also awarded to Ella Yousik and Ben Manhart.
JTF ensembles are adjudicated by a panel of Broadway and musical theater experts and professionals. This year’s panel of experts individually commented on the performance of many of CAPA’s ensemble members. In addition to comments made to those playing leading roles, the professional judges commented on the strength of the entire group in setting the scene by using ensemble members to realistically depict trees and birds in the woods and on the strength of Sadie Yousik’s realistic performance as Jack’s cow, Milky White. According to Melanie Prince, “every member of the ensemble is important and works together to make a high-quality performance.”
The weekend was rounded out by a headlining concert by Michael James Scott, who plays the Genie in Disney’s Aladdin on Broadway, dance and acting workshops taught by current Broadway professionals, and bonds formed with like-minded theater students from across the United States.
Carolina Academy of Performing Arts, mycapa.org, is currently working on summer stock musical theater workshops where the cast will learn and grow while performing the entire full production of Into the Woods as well as gearing up for auditions for next season’s company ensembles and JTF 2022.
