Boy Scouts of America

Theater Merit Badge

Theater
Merit Badge

Boy Scouts of America Merit Badge Hub

Boy Scouts of America
Merit Badge Hub

Theater

Theater Merit Badge Overview

While earning the Theater merit badge, Scouts will learn to appreciate live performances as members of the audience as well as go behind the footlights to see the view from the other side. Much more goes on in theater than ever meets the audience’s eye.
Theater_MB-overview

Theater Merit Badge Requirements

The requirements will be fed dynamically using the scout book integration
1. See or read three full-length plays.* Write a review of each. Discuss with your counselor the plot or story. If you chose to watch the plays, comment on the acting and the staging.
2. Write a one-act play that will take at least 10 minutes to perform. The play must have a main character, conflict, and a climax.
3. Discuss with your counselor the safety precautions that should be practiced when working in a theater to protect the cast and crew. Then do THREE of the following:
  • (a) Act a major part in a full-length play; or act a part in three one-act plays.
  • (b) Direct a play. Cast, rehearse, and stage it. The play must be at least 10 minutes long.
  • (c) Design the set for a play or a theatrical production. Make a model of it.
  • (d) Design the costumes for five characters in a theatrical production set in a historical time.
  • (e) Show skill in hair and makeup design. Make up yourself or a friend as a historical figure, a clown, an extraterrestrial, or a monster as directed.
  • (f) With your counselor's approval, help with the building and painting of the scenery for a theatrical production.
  • (g) With your counselor's approval, design the lighting for a play; or help install, focus, color, program, and operate the lighting for a theatrical production.
  • (h) With your counselor's approval, help install, focus, equalize, program, and operate the sound for a theatrical production.
  • (i) Serve as the stage manager for a theatrical production. Document all cues and stage setups in your calling script.
  • (j) Serve as musical director for a musical theater production.
4. Mime or pantomime any ONE of the following, chosen by your counselor.
  • (a) You have come into a large room. It is full of pictures, furniture, and other things of interest.
  • (b) As you are getting on a bus, your books fall into a puddle. By the time you pick them up, the bus has driven off.
  • (c) You have failed a school test. You are talking with your teacher, who does not buy your story.
  • (d) You are at camp with a new Scout. You try to help them pass a cooking test. The Scout learns very slowly.
  • (e) You are at a banquet. The meat is good. You don't like the vegetable. The dessert is ice cream.
  • (f) You are a circus performer such as a juggler, high-wire artist, or lion tamer doing a routine.
5. Explain the following: proscenium arch, central or arena staging, center stage, stage right, stage left, downstage, upstage, stage crew, flies, portal, cyclorama, stage brace, spotlight, floodlight, lighting control board, sound mixing desk, thrust staging, ground plans, and sightlines.

Get the Theater Merit Badge Pamphlet

Whether you enjoy expressing yourself onstage or behind the scenes, learn all the basics of theater through this merit badge! From acting and directing to stage management and lighting, you will cover it all by earning the Theater merit badge.

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Bray Barnes

Director, Global Security Innovative
Strategies

Bray Barnes is a recipient of the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award, Silver
Beaver, Silver Antelope, Silver Buffalo, and Learning for Life Distinguished
Service Award. He received the Messengers of Peace Hero award from
the royal family of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and he’s a life member of
the 101st Airborne Association and Vietnam Veterans Association. Barnes
serves as a senior fellow for the Global Federation of Competitiveness
Councils, a nonpartisan network of corporate CEOs, university presidents, and
national laboratory directors. He has also served as a senior executive for the
U.S. Department of Homeland Security, leading the first-responder program
and has two U.S. presidential appointments

David Alexander

Managing Member Calje

David Alexander is a Baden-Powell Fellow, Summit Bechtel Reserve philanthropist, and recipient of the Silver Buffalo and Distinguished Eagle Scout Award. He is the founder of Caljet, one of the largest independent motor fuels terminals in the U.S. He has served the Arizona Petroleum Marketers Association, Teen Lifeline, and American Heart Association. A triathlete who has completed hundreds of races, Alexander has also mentored the women’s triathlon team at Arizona State University.

Glenn Adams

President, CEO & Managing Director
Stonetex Oil Corp.

Glenn Adams is a recipient of the Silver Beaver, Silver Antelope, Silver Buffalo, and Distinguished Eagle Scout Award. He is the former president of the National Eagle Scout Association and established the Glenn A. and Melinda W. Adams National Eagle Scout Service Project of the Year Award. He has more than 40 years of experience in the oil, gas, and energy fields, including serving as a president, owner, and CEO. Adams has also received multiple service awards from the Texas Alliance of Energy Producers.