A childhood shaped by screens has subtly reshaped how children relate to one another, how they listen, how they speak, and how they show in a room. Today, conversations are increasingly happening through devices, as nearly half of teens report being online “almost constantly.”
As these children hide behind avatars, their confidence often follows. Many parents may sense this shift without always knowing how to counterbalance it in a way that feels healthy and meaningful for their children. Eric Rottman, owner and CFO of The Playground, has spent more than two decades watching change unfold from the front row.
At The Playground, a film and television acting training conservatory for budding actors and performers with a 21-year legacy, Rottman has worked with many children coming from diverse backgrounds. What he has come to recognize more clearly in recent years is that the most valuable outcome of the program hasn’t just been the number of students who go on to secure agents or book roles, but rather what happens to children long before the camera is turned on.
“I realized how beneficial the program can be just for instilling life skills. It’s going to give them confidence, help them speak clearly, and help them meet friends down the road. And I think parents are starting to understand that,” Rottman shares.
Rottman notes that parents often enroll their children with performance in mind. Within weeks, their priorities shift. “Four or five weeks into the program, they realize their kid is having fun, making friends, and learning,” he says. “Then they get a comment from a teacher saying, ‘Your son is raising his hand all the time now because he wants to show off that he can speak in public.’ We hear that over and over again, and I don’t take it lightly. That’s a big impact on a little life.”
The Playground was built on a curriculum designed and founded by industry-renowned Gary Spatz. Training begins with what the team calls life skills. These include vocal articulation exercises designed to sharpen clarity of speech, breathing and relaxation techniques aimed at relieving physical tension, theatre games and improvisation that teach listening and responsiveness, and scene study that develops empathy and emotional awareness.
COVID-19 accelerated a change Rottman had already begun noticing. “I saw how children returned to in-person environments with shorter attention spans. They had weaker reading abilities and more hesitation in face-to-face interaction,” he notes. Rather than viewing this as a setback, he adapted the program. A new “little ones” division for 5 and 6-year-olds removed the requirement to read and leaned into memorization and physical engagement.
The Playground
“We learned that what we’re doing really represents the childhood many of us had,” he reflects. “Not being on a phone, having to interact, using imagination. The kids don’t even realize what’s happening, but they love it because it’s healthy fun.” The structure of the program reinforces this experience. Students can enroll for six or twelve months at a time, and then continue into advanced and master-level courses if they choose to.
According to Rottman, one of the most memorable elements arrives in the second-year professional program. Students collaborate on short films, often shot on location, learning how to perform and curate the filming set. They rotate roles, hold boom microphones, support lighting, and experience filmmaking as a team. The culmination comes at a red-carpet graduation held in the AMC Century City cinema, where families watch the finished films on a big screen. “That night is a knockout. The kids and the parents remember it forever. It imprints the experience in a way that stays with them,” he shares.
Rottman notes that while many former students have gone on to professional careers, the “fame” is often the byproduct, not the main objective. He explains, “The thing we guarantee is the life benefits. They learn the craft, but they do it having fun, and it translates into everything else in their lives.”
The teaching team consists of working actors who bring real industry knowledge into the classroom. Rottman credits much of the success to the Program Director, Gayla Goehl who has extensive industry knowledge and is the premier teacher of all the professional classes at the conservatory. Rottman has observed that children from a myriad of social, cultural, and economic backgrounds train side by side, forming friendships that can often extend beyond the studio. Adults, too, have the opportunity to seek the same training through newly launched programs designed to improve communication and confidence later in life.
Ultimately, at The Playground, real growth reveals itself outside the studio, in classrooms, friendships, and everyday conversations where children can begin to carry themselves differently, and where confidence can show up quietly in raised hands, in steady voices, and in the comfort of being seen and heard.
