We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Roberta Cullen. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Roberta below.

Roberta, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

I spent about 18 years teaching acting and movement classes at a local community theatre in Alexandria, VA and at several public schools in their after school programs, as well as teaching drama classes at a small private school just outside of Alexandria. I helped start the summer camp program at the theatre with the encouragement of some parents, and it grew from three weeks of camp for 40 children to a program that runs all summer long and has more than 500 campers each year. The theatre was making so much money on summer camps, yet they remained focused on their performance schedule, which was geared towards adults and only included a handful of children in their annual Christmas Carol production.
I was growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of performance opportunities for children at the theatre at the same time the private school where I was teaching decided to build a new fine arts center, and the Head of School approached me and asked if I’d consider starting a children’s theatre program on weekends based at the school. My heart leapt! And then all of the “what ifs” started to float around in my mind.
What if I couldn’t start a business by myself? What if I couldn’t find fantastic teachers to help me? What if it was an embarrassing failure?
But after discussing the possibility with my entrepreneurial husband and a few friends, I decided to go for it, and we were off to a great start, then the pandemic hit.
Luckily we survived the pandemic and have grown, offering Saturday classes at Burgundy Farm Country Day school location, along with after school classes in Arlington and Alexandria locations.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

Having grown up in Appalachia, in a time and place where there weren’t after school activities or summer camps, I know the feeling of not being able to participate in creative pursuits, as well as the many benefits of doing so after starting to act in high school productions. At this stage in my life I’ve dedicated myself to making performing and theatre education available to as many children as I can, regardless of their family’s ability to pay for classes or camps. Knowing that paying for classes and camps poses one challenge for local families, and transportation is another obstacle many families face. To overcome those hurdles, I applied for a grant from Fairfax County and received an amount that would enable Alexandria Children’s Theatre to offer a camp adjacent to the trailer park where many Latino families are living south of the Beltway.
I hired Spanish-speaking or bilingual instructors and found neighborhood teens interested in working at that camp with the theme of Encanto. The children learned several songs and dances from the show and then their proud parents came to see it on the last day. It was a wonderful success!

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

Knowing firsthand that acting can provide an escape from challenging circumstances and help one live through difficulty and rise above it, I want to help underserved children develop their creativity to make their lives a bit easier, even if for an hour each week. I want children to be able to use their imaginations to create peaceful places for themselves, and to be able to develop an inner strength to believe in themselves regardless of what is happening in the world around them and what others say about them.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

If I could wave a magic wand, I would make sure that every student in every school had funding for drama and music classes taught by talented teaching artists who love working with children. Classes in the arts help create neural pathways in children’s brains that might lead to a child becoming an inventor or scientist who sees things a bit differently, perhaps finding cures for diseases or devising new ways of helping others, and modifying STEM to STEAM to include the arts is a step forward!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.ACTheatre.com
• Instagram: ac_theatre
• Facebook: alexandriachildrenstheatre

Image Credits
Photos by Joseph Edwards Photography.