Luna Stage Receives $28K from Orange Orphan Society for Pay-What-You-Wish Summer Camps, Green Screen Studio 

Kids Theatre Camp & Teen Summer Intensive

Luna Stage has received a $28,000 grant from the Orange Orphan Society to support its Pay-What-You-Wish Kids Theatre Camp and Teen Collaborator Intensive, and to install a new Green Screen Studio for use by both programs. 

WHEN: The camps will run July 6th - July 30th
WHERE: Luna Stage, 555 Valley Road, West Orange
For more information visit lunastage.org/kidstheatrecamp, lunastage.org/teensummercamps or email info@lunastage.org

The Kids Theatre Camp explores acting, improvisation, playwriting and creativity, with weekly themes including Magical Mysteries, Wilderness Adventures, Clowning Around and A Big Finale. Each week will build toward a short culminating performance.

The Teen Collaborator Intensive is a four-week program focusing on acting and filmmaking. Each day’s activities fuse film and theatre, with classes including on-camera technique, scene study, voiceover, film editing, playwriting, screenwriting, cinematography, animation, and improvisation, and will make use of Luna’s new Green Screen Studio. The Intensive will culminate in a public sharing of work created.

All Luna classes are taught by professional theatre artists in a warm and nurturing environment, and all skill levels are welcome.

The Pay-What-You-Wish model furthers Luna’s commitment to equity, ensuring that everyone has access to creative opportunities at a price point that feels comfortable to them. Luna launched this policy at the start of the pandemic, and is grateful to be able to continue it for the foreseeable future.

This is the fourth and largest grant that Luna has received from The Orange Orphan Society to support their work with local youth. Previous grants have supported the creation of Luna’s Teen Touring Conservatory, allowed Luna to lead playwriting workshops in local schools, and funded last summer’s Strangest Summer Filmmaking Program.

“We are thrilled to re-open outdoors with these vibrant programs for youth,” says Luna Stage Artistic Director Ari Laura Kreith. “It is thrilling to be able to create in-person again.”

“These programs build on the skills we nurtured virtually during the pandemic,” says Camp Director Joey Yow. “The Green Screen studio will allow us to take digital creativity to a whole new level.”

“We are also grateful to the New Jersey State Council on the Arts for a $20,000 Covid Safety grant earlier this year to support our safe re-opening,” added Kreith.

Further information and registration are available at www.lunastage.org.

About Luna Stage

Luna Stage develops and produces vibrant plays about local and global experiences. Firmly rooted in New Jersey's Valley Arts District — a crossroads of cultures — Luna brings our communities together for artistic events that spark conversations and create understanding and change.

The recipient of JerseyArts People’s Choice Award for Favorite Small Theatre in NJ for the past two years (2019 & 2020), Luna celebrates 10 years in its West Orange location this year. In addition to professional theatre productions on its MainStage and Luna 2, Luna offers classes for children and adults, opportunities for early-career and established theatre artists to develop new work, and has pivoted during the pandemic to offer a wide variety of free virtual programming.