★ theatre criticism starter pack ★

Cappies Critic Kit

Three pages: what the Cappies is, how to prep and take notes at a show, and the exact shape of a review that makes it into the newspaper.

new here? → read them in order the first time. After that, page 02 is the one to skim on the drive to a show, and page 03 is the one to keep open while writing.

page 01 · the program

so what even is the Cappies?

It’s a club where students review each other’s high school plays and musicals. The best reviews get printed in a real newspaper with your name on them. At the end of the year, the critics vote on the awards.

1999started · d.c. area
~12regions · u.s. + canada
3–9critics per school
400–500words per review

where it came from

Cappies is short for the Critics and Awards Program. It started in 1999 near Washington, D.C., a few months after the Columbine shooting, with one simple idea: schools cover their sports teams, so why not cover the kids making theatre? Fourteen schools signed up that first year. Now there are about a dozen regional programs around the U.S. and Canada, and the biggest one holds its awards night at the Kennedy Center.

how a season actually goes

join the critic team
Your school picks a small group, usually three to nine students, and a teacher runs it as the mentor. You don’t have to be in the shows — you just have to want to write.
learn the ropes
Before reviewing anything, new critics go through a training session: what to watch for, how to score fairly, how to write it up.
go see other schools’ shows
You get assigned to plays and musicals at other schools — never your own. Most regions want you to see at least five a year.
talk it out in the Cappies room
Critics meet before the show, at intermission, and after, to talk about what they just saw and vote on “Critics’ Choice” picks. What gets said in that room stays in that room. Forever.
write it + turn it in
Reviews get typed into the Cappies website with no name on them, due the Sunday of that same week. One second late counts as late.
get published
Mentors read every review and send the strongest ones to local newspapers, which print them with the student’s name on top. That’s a real clip you get to keep.
vote, then get dressed up
See enough shows and you get to vote on the nominations and the winners in 40-plus categories — acting, ensembles, sets, lights, sound, costumes, even marketing. The season ends with a big awards gala.

house rules

Students only. Awards go to grades 9–12, and grown-ups aren’t allowed to do the tech work.
Be a critic, not a fan. At a show you sit with the other critics, not with friends from the cast.
Keep it secret. No opinions, scores, or Critics’ Choice picks outside the room — and definitely not on social media.
Score like a normal person. Scores should average out somewhere in the middle over the year, not all 10s.

why it’s worth it ♥

Your name in print. Real newspaper clips, way before college applications are a thing.
You get fast at writing. 400 words, one week, every time. That skill works absolutely everywhere.
So much theatre. Five-plus shows a year at schools you’d never otherwise walk into.
You pick the winners. The critics vote on the awards. That’s the whole point of the program.

want in? → every region has its own calendar, show minimum, dues, and sign-up process, and every school runs it through a mentor teacher. Ask your theatre director or an English teacher, and check your regional Cappies site for the schedule.

page 02 · prep + notes

before the lights go down

Half of a good review happens before the curtain and in the dark. Show up already knowing the play, and leave with notes you can actually use on Sunday.

homework, but the fun kind

Read the play, or at least a real summary. Knowing how it ends means you can watch how they got there instead of just following along.
Look up where it came from. Who wrote it, what year it premiered, what it won, what was going on in the world. Two solid facts is plenty — that’s your second paragraph.
Check if there’s a famous version. If there’s a big movie or Broadway recording, know it exists — then judge this production on its own, not against Broadway.
Grab the program the second you get it. Full names, character names, and who designed what. Copy the tricky spellings into your notes right away.
Listen to the pre-show talk. About 20 minutes before curtain, a mentor points out specific things to watch for in this production. Write those down.
Pack the night before: binder, blank notes pages, a pen that works (no pen lights — they’re distracting), and something nice to wear.

the 4 things you’re judging

Every category — every actor, every tech element — gets looked at through these four. Keeping them in your head is what turns watching into reviewing.

presentation

How good was it? Did it work? Was it fun to watch?

originality

Fresh choices, or the version anybody would have done?

range

How many different notes did they hit — loud and quiet, funny and sad?

difficulty

How hard was this to pull off in the first place?

difficulty is the one people forget → a wobbly moment in something genuinely hard is often worth more than a safe choice done perfectly. Same for tech: a quick-change quartet or a live band mix is a much bigger swing than a single spotlight.

how to take notes in the dark

One rule beats all the others: write down what happened, not what you thought of it. Opinions are easy to remember later. Details are not.

do this

Nouns and verbs only. “Dropped the letter, picked it up with her foot” is usable. “SO GOOD!!” is not.
Names every time. Character or actor, spelled the way the program spells it.
Tag the moment — act, scene, or the song title — so you can find it again in the discussion.
Catch tech when it changes: a light shift, how fast a set moved, a sound cue that landed or didn’t.
Watch whoever isn’t talking. Ensemble reactions are where nobody else is looking.
Dump three more lines at intermission while act one is still fresh.

not this

Tiny handwriting. You are writing in the dark. Big loopy scrawl, one thought per line.
Scribbling through a quiet scene. Rustling is rude — watch it, then write at the applause.
Star ratings in the margin. Scores come later, in the room, on the sheet.
Trying to write everything. Ten specific moments beat forty half-finished ones.
Trusting your memory. By Sunday, every show turns into “it was good.”

what you write down

what it turns into

Act 1 tea scene — Gwendolen (P. Raghavan) chin up whole scene, drops once at sugar tongs

Paragraph 4. A tiny physical choice, described exactly. This is the sentence nobody else has.

Garden change, blackout, counted ~18 sec, lattice + 4 planters

Paragraph 6. Numbers make tech real, and prove you were paying attention.

Ensemble maid keeps re-folding the same napkin in background

Paragraph 5. Ensemble detail — the classic “nobody else caught that” line.

Mic 3 cut out top of Act 2, back by second verse

Your one criticism, with a specific example. Short, near the end, not the last paragraph.

then: the Cappies room

Right after the show, critics take about 45 minutes together to go through the show category by category, using those same four factors. The group votes by majority on the “Critics’ Choice” picks, then everybody scores privately on a 10-point scale, marks the performances worth nominating, signs the sheet, and hands it in.

two things to remember → aim for a season average around 5 or 6, so a 9 still means something in May. And none of it leaves the room — not the opinions, not the scores, not the Critics’ Choices. Not to the cast, not in a group chat, not ever.

page 03 · the template

how to build a review

Cappies teaches a seven-paragraph plan. It’s a starting shape, not a rule. Use it exactly for your first few shows, then start bending it once it feels automatic.

400–500 words · under 300 might not count · 4 sentences per paragraph, max

1 · lead2–3 sentences

Grab them fast. Either a zinger (one sharp line about the show) or a dramatic describer (open on one vivid moment from the stage). Serious plays usually want the describer.

2 · story

Who wrote it, when, and why anyone cares — then the plot in two or three sentences. Don’t spoil the ending.

3 · production

The big picture: what held the show together, or what didn’t. Pacing, mood, the directing choice you kept noticing.

4 · leads

The main actors, full names plus their characters. Say what they did with their voices and bodies instead of just saying they were good.

5 · supporting

A standout side character or two, plus the ensemble. This is where the best critics find the moment nobody else wrote about.

6 · tech

Pick the two or three that mattered most — set, lights, sound, costumes, props, makeup — and explain why they worked. Give credit for difficulty: running sound for a musical is way harder than for a small play.

7 · closer2–3 sentences

Land the idea the show was going for. Don’t recap the review — finish the thought the lead started.

non-negotiables

Past tense. By the time it prints, the show is over.
Stay out of it. No I, no we, no this critic.
Spell every name right — actors, crew, characters, playwright, composer. Check the program twice.
Show it, don’t rate it. Not “they had great chemistry” — say what the two of them actually did that made it feel that way.
Prove your criticism with one example, keep it short, and put it near the end (just not the very last paragraph).
No indenting. Skip a line between paragraphs, and don’t put your name in the file.

delete on sight

Clichés: stole the show, brought the house down, tour de force.
Report-card words: commendable, praiseworthy, unfortunate, marred.
“The audience loved it.” You can say what the audience did, not what it felt.
Adjective pileups. One perfect verb beats three describing words.
Blaming the script. You’re reviewing what the students made, not the play they picked.
Roasting little kids. If a performer is younger than high school: be nice or say nothing.
Anything copied off the internet.

here’s what that looks like

A short example — made-up show, made-up school — labeled paragraph by paragraph.

lead · zinger

Everyone in Rivermont High School’s The Importance of Being Earnest was lying, and every one of them was having a marvelous time doing it.

story

Oscar Wilde’s 1895 comedy follows two men who invent fake relatives to get out of their obligations, then get stuck in a country house with the women they have been lying to. Rivermont played it straight, in period, and fast.

leads · described, not rated

As Algernon, Marcus Bell delivered his best lines while chewing, timing each swallow so the insult landed a half-beat late. Opposite him, Priya Raghavan’s Gwendolen held her chin at the exact same angle through the whole tea scene, and lowered it once, when Cecily reached for the sugar tongs.

tech · two things, difficulty counted

The garden set carried the second act on a shallow stage with a lattice flat and four planters, moved into place in a blackout of under twenty seconds. Costumes by Elena Ford put the two couples in matching colors, so the mix-up of identities stayed easy to follow from the back row.

closer

Wilde wrote a comedy where being honest is the biggest trick of all. Rivermont’s cast played the lying so cheerfully that the truth, when it showed up, felt like the letdown.

217 words — a full review runs 400–500,
with paragraphs added for the production overall and the supporting cast.

how to actually do it → in the theatre, write down names and specific moments, not opinions. Draft the middle paragraphs first. Write the lead last, once you know what you’re really saying. Then cut anything that could have been written about any other show.

the program

prep + notes

the template