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Actor strides into pair of roles

If seeing a shooting star is lucky, Nash Walker has twice the charm. The aspiring child actor is currently rehearsing his parts in Twelfth Night, but when that show closes on Friday he goes straight into another play.
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Nash Walker is one of the young actors in Shooting Stars, the annual Shakespeare camp for Kids at Theatre NorthWest which is being directed by Melissa Glover.

If seeing a shooting star is lucky, Nash Walker has twice the charm.

The aspiring child actor is currently rehearsing his parts in Twelfth Night, but when that show closes on Friday he goes straight into another play. Both are productions of Shooting Stars Theatre.

Nash is one of three young thespians who are taking up the double challenge from director Melissa Glover, which is new this year. She has been offering an annual Shakespeare summer camp for youth since 2013, a spinoff of Debbie McGladdery's (a speech arts director now living elsewhere in B.C.) Bard In The Yard program. Now, though, Glover is also providing a modern theatre camp as well.

"It's an experiment," said Glover. "I heard a lot of families tell me they wanted to do a theatre camp but they were afraid of doing Shakespeare. Shakespeare is intimidating for some people, that's not a surprise. You can't do away with Shakespeare, because it's such enduring material and some people really love it, it is the core influence on everything we do in theatre to this day, but it's not easy stuff, especially for kids."

Although, I have to say, the kids love it once they get into it. But there was an appetite for a different form of theatre, so I'm trying that out this year."

Walker admits, he is only at the current camp out of theatrical obligation.

"I like acting but I don't like Shakespeare, but I do it because I like Mel and I learn so much from her. She's a good director," said the College Heights Elementary School student who is going into Grade 8 in September. He started in Shooting Stars when he was 10.

"I think having the two camps took some people away from the Shakespeare camp, there's only 10 of us this year, but that's great for us because everyone gets to do a lot of acting," said Nash, who is already considering a career in the performing arts.

He got his first taste of professional acting this past year when he was cast in a role for Theatre Northwest's production of It's a Wonderful Life: The Live Radio Play.

In Twelfth Night he portrays the character Malvolio, a favourite part among actors because it is a pompous antagonist within a comedy.

"He believes everyone in the higher class should have all the power and everyone in the lower classes should be treated like garbage," Walker said with a mischievous grin. "He gets told a lie that someone in a higher class was in love with him, and he falls for it because of his greed. It gets funny."

The lessons he's been learning this year, he said, are about voice projection, understanding character, how to take the centre of attention when it's appropriate for the character and how to shrink back when it's time for other characters to be in the spotlight.

"Having two camps means twice as much acting, twice as much getting better, and meeting so many more people to work with. More experiences," Walker said.

There are two showings of Twelfth Night on Friday, one at 2 p.m. and one at 7 p.m. Both are held at Theatre Northwest in Parkhill Centre.

Admission is by donation.

Anyone interested in joining the two-week modern theatre camp can send an email to shootingstarstheatre@gmail.com or message them on their Shooting Stars Theatre page on Facebook.