I am Christa Waterwiese, a senior International Relations major and History minor. This year, in the fall and spring, I am interning at the Grandin Theatre Film Lab. The Grandin Film Lab is an integrated model of experiential learning in filmmaking for high school students in the Roanoke and Salem area. The Film Lab teaches students film production, lighting, screenwriting, storytelling, acting, sound engineering, and film industry acumen. The program is through the Historic Grandin Theatre, which is just across the street. The students spend their time learning and then developing their own short films in the second semester of the program. The short films are even submitted to film contests across the country!
This year the Film Lab has two separate groups, Beginners and Advanced. I am interning with the Beginners on Mondays and Wednesdays. Since I have started, the Beginners (almost all sophomores) have begun working on understanding the breakdown of stories and script writing. As the intern, I help with administrative duties and serve as a teacher’s assistant to the Program Coordinator. This past session was the most interactive so far. The students started developing their own screenplay scripts based on songs they chose. I went between the students and helped them cultivate their ideas, assist with understanding screenplay formatting, and helped with learning the program. Their scripts are due this coming Wednesday, and I will continue to help the students write on Monday.
