Lower School Production
A new year and yet another new approach to putting on the Lower School play. This year was, of course, going to be different due to the lack of boys in drag and it did interest me to see how many of the twenty-two girls in the IIIrds would get involved. In the end, well over half did and the concentration and performance skills that they brought to rehearsals brought everything up to a higher level.
In previous years, a single play has been rehearsed by a member of staff and brought up to a performance. This year the Lower Sixth Theatre Studies groups took on the role of writers and directors, bringing to the stage a multitude of fairy stories, ranging from relatively straight renditions of ‘Snow White’ and ‘Peter Rabbit’ to physical comedy in ‘Chicken Licken’ and the superbly written ‘The Very Ugly Duckling Who Grew Up to be a Very Ugly Duck’. Harriet Ryland gave an excellent performance as the witch in ‘Hansel and Gretel’ and ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’ featuring Emily Hughes (as a wonderful chavette) also contained very strong performances. The individual plays were held together by the story of ‘The Little Match Girl’, played by Victoria Weaver. She brought a powerful, sensitive start to the performance and every time she lit a match a new play would start. All told, over fifty pupils were involved.
What was important, apart from the sense of achievement gained after a successful performance, was that pupils from different year groups interacted positively. The process of evolving a script in rehearsal was given due care and attention; since group sizes were relatively small and under constant supervision from an eager band of Sixth Form students, pupils learnt from each other. The Sixth Form gained confidence and developed practical creative ideas; the Lower School pupils each enjoyed their moment in the limelight, giving them crucial stage experience.
Many thanks to the Lower Sixth involved, especially Edward Leftwich, who took a step forward to stage-manage on the day. My message to all those in the Lower School is to ‘stay creative’!
Mr A Avery