Lampooning big dreams and high melodrama, this comedy about the kids and counsellors at a stagey summer camp is charming, and brilliantly brutal.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 18, 2024

Mostly improvised, it’s an amusing celebration of community seen through a song and dance lens as the chaotic but devoted staff at a summer camp instruct their dedicated young charges, ignore their own failings, and make sure that several shows go on.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Dec 21, 2023

Achieves the rare trick of creating a fictional work-within-the-work that is supposed to be really good, and actually is.

| Dec 13, 2023

The cast makes up such an effective ensemble that it’s hardly fair to single out individuals, but Noah Galvin is wonderful as the harried and ever-resourceful stage manager who has yet to experience the luxury of sitting down.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 7, 2023

Depending on your level of initiation, Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman’s pitch-perfect satire Theater Camp will either trigger mortifying flashbacks... or play like a psychoanalyst’s field study in hysteria.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 29, 2023

It’s enjoyable stuff, particularly the bracingly catty sniping of the first two-thirds.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 27, 2023

Having laughed all the way through, you’ll leave the cinema feeling moved too.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 25, 2023

The mockumentary is in safe hands with this talented team. And at a breezy 90-minute running time their film is exactly what you need to ward off the end-of-summer blues.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Aug 25, 2023

Theater Camp is itself shamelessly infatuated with the great American musical, but it also enjoys poking affectionate fun at the kids’ creative tunnel vision.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 25, 2023

A thesp fest with some great kids and cameos, but a little cliquey despite its intentions.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 24, 2023

Like the Guest films, Theater Camp’s comedy springs entirely from personality: the jokes aren’t really quotable because they depend on you knowing who’s making them to work.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 23, 2023

It’s a zippy 90 minutes or so, and packed with jokes.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 23, 2023

Theater Camp is a feel-good delight, and a sign of impressive directorial talent from Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 22, 2023

The film deftly captures the high emotional stakes of being a theater kid, whether you’re still a child or a full-grown adult.

| Jul 29, 2023

For theater nerds, and the ambitious young thespians they foster, this Sundance gem is likely to be the summer’s funniest feel-good film.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jul 28, 2023

If it doesn't reach the heights of Guest's works — "Waiting for Guffman" is its clear antecedent — it's recognizably funny, where you might acknowledge a particular joke is funny even if it doesn't leave you laughing out loud.

| Original Score: B- | Jul 27, 2023

Even those who never did theater camp can enjoy Theater Camp.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 21, 2023

It’s excruciatingly unfunny for the first 74 of its 94 minutes before suddenly revealing an impressive flourish of creativity.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Jul 21, 2023

Earnest and ridiculous in equal measure, Theater Camp makes clear that places like AdirondACTS are microcosms of magical weirdness.

| Jul 18, 2023

The message of Theater Camp is clear: Its eccentric world of show tunes and show people is big enough (and funny enough) for everyone.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 18, 2023