Cameron Wilmert Wins 4-H Grand Champion at the Illinois State Fair with his Godspell experience

 

[August 28, 2024] 

Cameron Wilmert,13, of Lincoln took his love of theater and his role in this summer’s Lincoln Community Theatre production of the musical Godspell and turned them into a 4-H Grand Champion project at the 2024 Illinois State Fair. Wilmert presented his project in Theater Arts to the 4-H judge in Springfield on Saturday, August 10, to earn the title, however, his first step was submitting his entry to the Logan County Fair during the last days of July. The Logan County Fair 4-H judge awarded Wilmert’s project a first-place ribbon and a designation as State Fair delegate that moved him on to the state level.

Wilmert, a member of Cloverdale 4-H Club for five years, entered the Logan County Fair upon receiving a nomination for 4-H Member of the Year from his club leader Leslie Starasta. While Wilmert was already planning to work on a Theater Arts project, he was not necessarily planning the timing around the county fair as was required to accept the nomination. He picked his project in October 2023 assuming he would use his experience in summer theater camp. However, at the beginning of March of this year, Wilmert was telling his mother, Cari Wilmert, that he was sad because it had been a long time since he had been in a show besides theater camp. His mother mentioned the auditions for Lincoln Community Theatre’s summer season were coming up the next week, although he was not familiar with the shows.

His mother played for him “Day by Day,” the most well-known song from Godspell, and “All for the Best,” an upbeat duet between Jesus and Judas. He said, “When I heard “All for the Best, I was in!” He learned Judas' part to “All for the Best” in just a few days and auditioned for LCT’s Godspell with that song. In the meantime, he convinced his mother to audition also, and they ended up on stage together for the first time. What became his 4-H project started out just for fun.

The 4-H project was participating in Godspell itself and his presentation to the judges was about his experiences, what he learned, and how he learned it. Rather than a typical tri-fold poster board illustrating his learning process, Wilmert chose to compile a scrapbook of photos accompanied by text which tells the whole story of the production from auditions through rehearsals and performances to striking the set after the last show.

He decided a scrapbook would be an excellent keepsake about putting together and performing a production that he loved. The scrapbook itself was not the project, but it “enhanced my oral presentation,” he explained.

The interview with the Illinois State Fair 4-H judge was supposed to take 10 minutes, but Wilmert’s interview lasted 25 minutes. In addition to the scrapbook, Wilmert also took the accordion he learned to play expressly for performing on stage during the song “All Good Gifts.” He offered to play it for her, but she had to decline in the interest of time. She was interested to know if he planned to continue pursuing the accordion, but he is as yet uncertain of how the accordion may fit into his future. Upon finding out later that he won Grand Champion, Wilmert said, “I was very surprised! I vaguely knew I was being very animated when I was talking about it. The judge even said something about this.”

So what did Wilmert learn about theater that made him so animated? “I learned so much in Godspell!,” he said “It was so fun! Most of the learning was before the presentation. It was emotional learning and it was hard. I didn’t want to. But I learned that to be sad or crying [on stage] to ACT sad that you don’t have to BE sad. We [his mother and he] talked about it and every practice in the early rehearsals of Jesus’ crucifixion scene my mom would say to me, ‘It’s not real. It’s okay.’”

Wilmert says his favorite thing about Godspell was the cast. He explains, “Because we already knew most people from other shows. It was getting to do something you like with friends. We were supposed to be a family in the show and we were. When we know each other it makes things flow easier. It makes a difference how the cast likes each other, which was no problem at all [in Godspell].”

No stranger to the stage, Wilmert estimates he has taken part in five shows and even more theater camps directed by his mother at the Lincoln Park District every summer. Coming from a theatrical family, he speculates that he has been around theater since he was an infant.

Previously, Wilmert has entered 4-H projects in the Logan County Fair in the areas of geology and public speaking, in addition to other non-fair 4-H projects including robotics and oral interpretation. What does he like so much about 4-H? “I like learning new things,” he says, “I especially like taking something I already know and making it better. Usually I find something that I already like and see if I can learn more about it. Not so much learning something new, but improving what I already have. Next year I might try something completely different and try something new.”

His mother says that “Cameron is amazing and musically talented” and anyone able to see his performance in LCT’s Godspell this summer would certainly agree. At just 13 years old, the Lincoln community is fortunate to have many more years to enjoy his prodigious talents. Congratulations to Cameron on his hard work and his Grand Champion project!

[Stephanie Hall]