An interview with Stage Academy Teacher Helen Wint
I'm getting really excited for the launch of Stage Academy classes at Highgate Primary School and Lauderdale House in the new year. I decided to have a quick catch up with one of our amazing, industry professional teachers, Helen Wint, to find out more about her performing career and what she will be bringing to the students at Stage Academy.
Tell me more about your career as a performer?
I started my professional career in TV working for the BBC on a series called "I Dream". From there I moved into Musical theatre starring in productions such as Daddy Cool, Dirty Dancing and Dancing in the Streets in the West End, and internationally. I have also been lucky enough to travel the world as a singer combining two of my favourite things - performing and travel!
What is your most memorable experience working as a performer?
Perhaps my first job where I worked opposite Christopher Lloyd from the "Back to the Future" film franchise. I felt so incredibly lucky to be working for the BBC and we spent three months filming in Barcelona so it was an incredible experience.
What advice would you give to a young person wanting to get into performing arts?
My advice to any young performers wanting to get into the industry would be to believe in yourself and practise practise practise. Faith and determination go a long way!
What will you be teaching at Stage Academy next term?
I will be teaching Singing and Acting for TV and Film, which is this terms special "Success" module.
What excites you most about teaching at Stage Academy?
I am excited to discover and nurture young talent, help the children discover their own unique and individual gifts and to be as inspiring as my teachers were to me when I was young.
To find out more about our classes click here
Spaces are filling quickly for the start of term on the 9th and 11th of January, click here to book your free trial today.
Introducing team Highgate
As the principal of Stage Academy Highgate it is my job to put together an incredible team of inspiring industry professional teachers. I am proud to introduce to you all the amazing team we have secured to work with us in Highgate at Highgate Primary School and Lauderdale House from January 2020. They will be working tirelessly to deliver Act, Sing, Dance and Succeed sessions to our 6-18s students and to ignite the imaginations of our 4-6s with our specially written education resources. Our teachers are multi-talented and work with all students across the academy teaching a variety of subjects. Read on to find out more about our brilliant team, then book your free trial for January to see for yourself how they encourage self-confidence, teamwork, ambition, responsibility and success in our students, both on-stage and off.
Helen Wint - Performing Arts Teacher
Helen began her performing career playing a lead role in the BBC series ‘I Dream’. Other TV work includes ‘Doctors’, ‘Eurovision: You Decide’ and Children in Need. She played the role of Clover in the short Film “A very ham-fisted stake out”. Helen played Isis In the West End Musical ‘Daddy Cool’, Diana Ross in ‘Dancing in the Streets’, and toured the UK with the hit show ‘Dirty Dancing’. She has appeared in various commercials for Premier Inn, Ikea and Boots and was also part of the workshops for “Respect La Diva”, “Instant Celebrity…just add water”, “Celia” and the Perfect Pitch Award. Helen is a founding member and managing partner of the corporate entertainment group ‘Goldstone’. In 2018 Goldstone represented the UK in the international singing competition ‘Voice of Astana’ and were awarded 1st place. Helen can't wait to inspire your child on their journey to success at Stage Academy.
Kieran Parrott - Performing Arts Teacher
Kieran was born and raised in London and has worked as a Performing Arts teacher for six years. After returning from four years of training at the renowned Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts, he decided to pass on his skills to the future generation. With a drive to become the teacher that he had himself as a child, Kieran’s main motivation has been to get the best out of the children he teaches, helping them to gain confidence in not just the performing world but in life as a whole. It also fills him with pride to see that a number of his past students have gone on to train at some of the UK’s leading drama schools. Alongside his teaching career, Kieran performs professionally. He stars as Franki Valli for the Jersey Guys, one of the UK’s leading Jersey Boys tribute acts and is playing Muddles in the Snow White pantomime this festive season in Welwyn Garden City.
Rhiannon Hill - Academy Assistant
Rhiannon is a graduate of London Studio Centre where she studied professional Jazz Theatre Dance, she also holds a BAHons degree in Music and has worked with various young peoples organisations such as the Duckegg Theatre Company, Plus-Educational and NOTORiOUS KiDS. Rhiannon is looking forward to supporting the Stage Academy team to inspire self-confidence, teamwork, ambition, responsibility and success in all of our students.
A little more about me - Your Stage Academy Principal
My name is Andrew and I will be your Stage Academy principal I have half a decade of experience working with young people of all ages and have performed professionally in the UK and overseas since graduating from the prestigious Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in London. Within the entertainment world I have worked with brands such as TUI, P&O Cruises and Merlin Entertainments. As a teacher I have managed several performing arts schools across London and have extensive experience in safeguarding, first aid, curriculum building and child engagement. I am passionate about bringing out the best in everyone at Stage Academy and I can't wait to meet you at one of our classes soon.
Book your free trial
We are proud to offer a completely free, no-obligation trial session to everyone who would like to try out Stage Academy for the first time, it is truly the best way to see the Stage Academy difference for yourself and to make sure our classes are right for your child. Click here to book today.
Want to find out more?
There is a wealth of information about our classes across our website, but if you have questions, please do no hesitate to contact us by emailing contact@stageacademy.co.uk or call us on 0800 808 5327. The team looks forward to hearing from you soon.
What are the Stage Academy STARS?
When we created Stage Academy we wanted to be more than just another part-time performing arts school. So many these days claim to boost confidence and social skills alongside their professional performing arts training but fail to back up that claim with a strong educational framework which allows them to do so and to feedback to parents about progress effectively. That is why we created the Stage Academy STARS.
The Stage Academy STARS are self-confidence, teamwork, ambition and responsibility - focusing on them leads to success in everything our students do in the performing arts and their day to day lives.
When planning lessons not only do our teachers strive to provide the best possible professional performing arts training but they also ensure that every lesson links in with at least one of the Stage Academy STARS keeping learning relevant and engaging.
We even build the Stage Academy STARS into our reports for parents. You can expect to hear from us not only about how your child has progressed in terms of their acting, singing and dancing but how they have embraced the Stage Academy STARS too!
I thought it would be insightful for me to share with you what I see in each of the Stage Academy STARS and why I think they are essential to our students of all ages.
Self-confidence
Self-confidence is quite possibly the biggest benefit young people can draw from drama and the performing arts. When you work with young people there is nothing better than watching as their confidence blossoms and they overcome their internal barriers to performing at the best of their ability.
Of course in Stage Academy classes we will be nurturing your child’s self-confidence to put on amazing acting, singing and dance performance with us but this new found belief can easily translate to areas outside of our classes. The confidence to present information confidently in a school classroom, the motivation to try something new and the spark of creativity to be a whiz at English, Maths and Science are just a few examples of how mastering the performing arts can be incredibly valuable in all walks of life.
Teamwork
Teamwork is the collaborative effort of a group to achieve a common goal or to complete a task in the most effective and efficient way. At Stage Academy we work as a team all the time, from mastering a new warm up game to performing in a big musical theatre ensemble every member of that team has an important contribution to make towards our success.
Ambition
To us, ambition is all about empowering our students to strive to be the very best that they can be. We work with our students to set realistic and manageable, short, medium and long term goals, then we support them in making those goals a reality. We hope that as our students see their ambitions becoming a success during their time with us they will foster a new found confidence to have lofty ambitions throughout the rest of their lives setting them up for a positive future.
Responsibility
Responsibility is a key skills for children and adults alike. It is key that we can all make decisions, be trusted and act in a way that portrays us in the best possible light to the outside world. We lead by example at Stage Academy being responsible in everything that we do and giving students appropriate opportunities to make their own decisions and be trusted to act independently.
Success
Why do we focus so much on our Stage Academy STARS? The answer is simple, we want every student we work with to experience success. Of course this means success in the performing arts, our mission is to provide the very best professional part-time performing arts training after all, but it equally means success in all areas of life.
We would love to speak to you more about how Stage Academy could benefit your child, please do not hesitate to get in touch by emailing contact@stageacademy.co.uk or give us a call on 0800 808 5327.
Audition Tips
There are no auditions to become a student at Stage Academy, our classes are open to all regardless of experience and ability providing a safe and welcoming environment for young people to express themselves and develop their performing skills. As a performer however, auditions are unavoidable, but there are many things you can do to make them a positive and fulfilling experience. Here are just a few of my top tips for audition success.
Be Prepared
As the saying goes, failing to prepare is preparing to fail. To more work you do in preparation for your audition the more confident and at ease you will feel on the day - leading to a performance that shows you off at your best. An audition is far more than the time you spend in-front of the audition panel.
- Read the material - you must understand the context of the material you are using, if it is a song from a musical, listen to the whole cast recording. If it is a monologue, read the rest of the play. What you learn will inform your acting decisions making your performance far more believable!
- Research - make sure you know the answers to who, what, where, why, when in relation to your audition pieces. Also find out about the writer, producer, director and casting director so you can answer questions with confidence and enthusiasm.
- Line learning - it sounds obvious, but make sure you are totally confident in your audition material, know it to the point that it is second nature. You shouldn’t be thinking about what line comes next, you need to focus that energy on your character choices and performance. For more help with line learning see my blog post here.
Be Yourself
"Use your wonderful youth and who you are. A lot of the time you can look at other actors and go 'they're so brilliant at doing that, why can't I do that?' But you are a complete individual and there's no-one else on the planet like you. You by nature of being you will make it your own, so just believe in that and let that happen."
Helen Mirren
It is so important to play to your strengths as a performer, as the quote says, this will allow you to make it your own and thus stand out from the crowd. At Stage Academy alongside working on performance skills we focus on self-confidence, teamwork, ambition and responsibility which can all contribute towards audition success.
Enjoy!
It’s easy to get so worked up over an audition that you forget to have fun. I am guilty of it. We become so focused on impressing and wanting to get that job that we forget why we got into drama and the performing arts in the first place. Remember your love, remember your passion and see every audition as an opportunity to perform. Enjoy every moment!
How do we choose a Stage Academy venue?
As you may already know, we at Stage Academy pride ourselves on making safety and security the top priority in everything we do whilst delivering the best quality of performing arts classes out there, but we simply can’t deliver this without amazing venues. As such we have developed strict criteria for selecting venues and I thought it would be a great idea to share that criteria with you, our parents. As we get excited about the launch of our brand new venues in Highgate in January I think you will be interested to see how they stack up.
Keeping your child safe
A Stage Academy venue must be safe and secure. We look to make sure that we can make the classroom area a secure space where you can leave your child with confidence, we ensure the venue has adequate emergency exits, fire protection and electrical safety. It is crucial that the space is appropriate for our activities generally meaning it should be large, clear from obstructions and an adequate temperature for physical activities. All of this gives our parents a positive first impression and confidence when they bring their child along for a free trial that they are in a friendly, welcoming and safe environment. I would encourage you to read more about keeping your child safe at Stage Academy, just click here.
Location, location, location
We know how busy the life of a parent is so we want to make sure our venues are in the most convenient of places. Stage Academy – Highgate Primary School is within a 10 minute drive of many North London areas including Highgate, Crouch End, Muswell Hill, East Finchley and Fortis Green. Our Highgate Lauderdale House venue is convenient for parents in Archway too. Both venues are surrounded by ample free on street parking and public transport links. In April we are opening Stage Academy Hammersmith which is just moments away from Westfield London shopping centre so you can make the most of the time that your children are with us.
Enrichment and educational value
For us at Stage Academy, it is not enough for our venues to simply be a suitable room for our activities. They need to have something special about them, that extra spark that completes the experience for our parents, students and staff.
In the case of Stage Academy – Highgate Primary School we have three big open spaces, not just classrooms with the tables and chairs pushed to the side, something I am passionate about avoiding. We also have a stage space year round that our students can practice performing on and we can use for regular presentations of work to parents.
At Stage Academy Jrs – Highgate Lauderdale House our class is within an arts and education centre based in a historic house in Highgate. Here you will discover a surprising blend of historic elegance and creative opportunities, a building steeped in history and alive with activity.
Finally for Stage Academy – Hammersmith we have chosen a venue with state of the art facilities. We have a beautiful dance studio with full length mirrors and natural light as well as a professional drama studio with blackout curtains and amazing high ceilings.
Whichever Stage Academy venue your child attends they will be taught in fantastic surroundings.
What about the parents?
We want parents to enjoy the Stage Academy experience too, so while we are a drop off class we make sure there are nearby facilities you can use to make the most of your time. Pop to the cafe in Lauderdale House for a coffee and beautiful views or nip to Westfield shopping centre after dropping off your child at our Hammersmith venue. But remember we will be inviting you into the classrooms regularly so you can see the incredible work our students have been up too!
Truly the best way to find out about Stage Academy is to experience a free trial session – click here to book today – we can’t wait to see you at your local venue very soon.
Top five line learning tips
I recently found myself in the position of having to learn pages and pages of script for an acting job in a very short space of time and it reminded me of just how difficult it can be to retain so much information. I found myself becoming bored quickly and slipping into time wasting patterns of procrastination delaying the inevitable which only served to make the situation more difficult. It was then that I decided to knuckle down, think back to my training and practice what I preach. There are many techniques out there to make line learning easier and dare I say maybe even fun? At Stage Academy we ask our students to learn lines from time to time so it is important for us to support them in that task, we do so by understanding their learning style and capabilities to set them a realistic challenge with the right advice to make it achievable. For me, I find that using a combination of techniques helps lines to go in much faster and increases the fun factor. Everyone is different though so here are my five top tips for learning those all important lines. Why not try them out at home for you or your child’s next big performance?
One – Writing Lines
No, I don’t mean you are being sent to detention. Writing out your lines by hand can be incredibly useful for retention. I recommend splitting your script up into small chunks if it is a monologue or line by line in the case of a scene with multiple characters. Write the lines out by hand three to four times and then move onto the next chunk, you can also try reading them out loud as you write them onto the paper to solidify the learning.
Two – Recording and Listening
If you record yourself saying your lines you can listen back to them on the tube, bus, while brushing your teeth or making dinner. The most common reason I hear for not having learned lines is that there wasn’t enough time to do so. This tip helps you to make the most of the time that otherwise wouldn’t be so productive.
Three – A Little and Often
While it may be tempting to cram all your line learning in the night before, or even worse, the morning of your rehearsal or performance, please, don’t be tempted. Your brain needs the time to make and solidify the neural connections required to remember lines with confidence. Instead dedicate a small amount of time, say 10 to 15 minutes per day to learning your lines over the course of a week. You will find yourself to be much more confident when it comes to your delivery.
Four – Bed Time Story
If your child has lines to learn for a school play or Stage Academy show use bedtime to your advantage. Instead of a traditional bedtime story try reading their lines to them. Each evening, encourage them to deliver more of their own lines whist you read out the ones in-between. A day in the life of a child can be so busy with school, homework, clubs and social events so this tip is perfect for making the most of their time and making it feel less like hard work!
Five – Lets Get Physical
Everyone is different but I know I can’t sit still when learning lines. I find that getting up and physically acting out what I am saying whilst reading my lines out loud helps to make sense of the journey my character is going on. This thorough understanding of the script contributes to more efficient line learning and a confident performance.
Bonus Round – Know Your Style
It is scientifically proven that we all learn differently. You may be a visual, auditory or kinaesthetic learner, a mixture of a couple or all three. Take some time to understand which line learning techniques work most effectively for you and focus on those to be the most productive.
I hope those tips helped you out. Still struggling? Why not comment below and I’ll see what I can do to help or come along for a free trial at Stage Academy where my team and I can give you the support you need to achieve your goals – I can’t wait to see you there!