Master Classes Offer Self-Discovery Through the Arts

CJay Philip’s students sat on stage in a circle at the Cahill Performing Arts Center in Baltimore, speaking and singing gratitude in a call and response led by their teacher. It was the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and they had just finished a full day of master class workshops taught by Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama(opens in new window) faculty.

Philip is the 2024 recipient of the Excellence in Theatre Education Award(opens in new window), presented each year at the Tony Awards by Carnegie Mellon University in partnership with the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League. The master class is offered as part of the award. Philip’s company, Dance & Bmore, is a multidisciplinary, Baltimore-based ensemble presenting a unique fusion of movement, music, theatrics and spoken word through socially conscious and interactive works. Her programs engage grade school students to senior citizens and everyone in between.

As one of the top theater schools in the country, the CMU School of Drama brings its world-class training to students from a myriad of backgrounds, experience levels and geographic locations through these master classes. This year’s visiting faculty were Robert Ramirez(opens in new window) (head of the School of Drama), Rick Edinger(opens in new window) (area chair of acting/music theater), Lisa Velten Smith(opens in new window) (assistant professor of voice and associate area chair of acting/music theater), and Tomé Cousin(opens in new window) (professor of dance). They were joined by Broadway actor, educator, and alumna of the School of Drama, Jesmille Darbouze, who served as a judge in selecting Philip.

Velten Smith kicked off the day by guiding the group — about 30 students, ranging in age from late teens to early 20s — through a series of physical and vocal warmups. The exercises, which began as shaking out the tension in their bodies and warming their mouths up with tongue twisters, eventually led to an acting exercise, where Ramirez joined in, inviting them to put intention and objective behind the words and movements.

Ramirez then led a session on auditioning, teaching the basics of entering a room and showing up as your authentic self. Several students came prepared with monologues, and Ramirez offered adjustments and feedback. In his work with a student named Steven, who prepared a Shakespearean monologue, Ramirez encouraged him to shake free from some preconceived notions about what Shakespeare “should” look or sound like, and to instead bring himself into the character.

“To watch the idea spark and to see him make that transition from something that was very well-prepared and put together, but highly presentational, to something that was so authentically himself was really exciting,” Ramirez said. “And we could feel it in the room. All the students, our faculty, CJay — everyone felt something shift when Steven understood that to be authentically himself, even inside a Shakespeare piece, is infinitely interesting.”

After a lunch break, the students reconvened on stage, sitting in a circle for a discussion and Q&A with Darbouze and Edinger. Darbouze, who recently appeared on Broadway as Kristine Linde in the critically acclaimed revival of “A Doll’s House” and is also an educator, was part of the panel that selected Philip as the Excellence in Theatre Education Award winner. She remarked on how special it was, having been part of the selection committee, to now get to meet Philip’s students and see the impact of Philip’s work firsthand.

“Her students are these incredible human beings,” said Darbouze, “So confident, so sure of themselves and their place in the arts, and I think that’s a real testament to the beautiful work that CJay is doing with them here.”

The students ended their day with what has become somewhat of a mythic component of the CMU School of Drama master class experience — Cousin’s dance session. Cousin has been on faculty at the School of Drama since 2011 and maintains a professional career as a choreographer, director and intimacy coordinator. He led the students through a series of dance and movement warmups, including one of his standards, which he teaches to every student who goes through the School of Drama’s acting/music theater program — “The Monster.”

“It’s about developing a character by taking all the energy that’s living inside you and letting it out,” Cousin said.

Philip said it was gratifying to see her students, whom she has nurtured and spent so much time with, excel in these classes taught at such a high level.

“Watching the students in the master class was bringing me so much joy — watching them dance, be brave, try new things; watching them show off a little bit because they’re clever and they’re funny and they know it,” she said.