Saint Michael's College student Marla Caram of Hudson lands internship with professional theater

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Marla Caram, Saint Michael's College student from Hudson, lands internship with professional summer theater, the Saint Michael's Playhouse.

COLCHESTER, VT (07/31/2012)(readMedia)-- Marla Caram, a rising senior at Saint Michael's College, is interning for the second summer in the professional Saint Michael's Playhouse, which is owned and operated by the college. As an experienced administrative intern, Ms. Caram is called upon to perform a wide range of tasks, helping the company manager run errands, handle housing and other issues for the actors. She also works on sets, handles all kinds of carpentry tools, and especially helps run the box office.

"I wish I could spend all day and all night in the theater," said Ms. Caram, a Saint Michael's College theater major, of course, with a double minor in business and studio art. Ms. Caram is the daughter of Bruce and Kathleen Caram of Hudson, Mass. Mrs. Caram is a 1980 graduate of Saint Michael's College, and several of her siblings are also graduates of the college, where their father, Dr. Edward Foley, was a physics professor for years.

Marla Caram has learned to handle any emergency, for instance, being short on ushering staff one night and having find extra space for a wheel chair. She was also called on to re-make a sign for the current show Forever Plaid, since the director did not like the design of a sign that had to be hung on the set.

Playing Snoopy in You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown

Currently Ms. Caram is rehearsing the role of Snoopy in You're a Good Man Charlie Brown, which is being staged by Playhouse Junior, composed of Saint Michael's students and recent grads. The show will be performed Friday, August 3, at 12 noon; Saturday, August 4, at 10 a.m., and Sunday, August 5, at 10 a.m. and 12 noon for area children, before the professionals take the stage for Forever Plaid.

Ms. Caram spent a semester of her junior year studying at Queen Mary University inLondon where she acted in two shows. Second semester at Saint Michael's College, she was involved in four shows, acting, designing, and stage managing. She is president of the SMC Drama Club this coming year, and has big plans for staging a show in an unusual venue off campus.

Clearly in love with theater, Ms. Caram is deciding just where she wants to focus her career, whether acting, directing, or working in scene design. But this summer she is getting a good close look at many aspects of theater. Some nights she stays until the wee hours of the morning working on sets, learning and doing things she would not have a chance to do during the school year.

"I've been onstage since pre-school," she said. "And now I'm learning so much from professional directors and designers." It's been a dream summer for the hard-working theater student.

Playhouse background

Founded in 1947, Saint Michael's Playhouse features talent from Broadway, Off-Broadway, and regional theaters nationwide, and attracts approximately 16,000 theatergoers each season. An auxiliary enterprise of Saint Michael's College, the Playhouse is greater Burlington's only actors' Equity resident theater company and operates under contract with Actors' Equity Association in New York City. At the same time, Saint Michael's College students have the opportunity to learn from the pros through internships in technical theater, costuming, lighting, set construction, publicity, and occasionally, on-stage roles.

Learn What Matters at Saint Michael's College, The Edmundite Catholic liberal arts college, www.smcvt.edu  . Saint Michael's provides education with a social conscience, producing graduates with the intellectual tools to lead successful, purposeful lives that will contribute to peace and justice in our world. Founded in 1904 by the Society of St. Edmund and headed by President John J. Neuhauser, Saint Michael's College is located three miles from Burlington, Vermont, one of America's top college towns. Identified by the Princeton Review as one of the nations Best 376 Colleges, and included in the Fiske Guide to Colleges 2013, Saint Michael's has 1,900 undergraduate students and 500 graduate students. Saint Michael's students and professors have received Rhodes, Woodrow Wilson, Pickering, Guggenheim, Fulbright, and other grants. The college is one of the nation's top-100, Best Liberal Arts Colleges as listed in the 2012 U.S. News & World Report rankings.

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