SUMMER FESTIVAL
Community, collaboration and creativity
This year we are launching our Summer Festival – a fringe festival of theatre and workshops to inspire and enrich our community. In the last week of term, the whole school will be invited to see a range of performances and participate in workshops over three afternoons in July.
The festival headlines with William’s Golding’s Lord of the Flies, adapted for the stage by Nigel Williams. This will see the TA Hall transormed into a deserted island, where a group of school children must fend for themselves. As they struggle to survive and build a new society, their primal instincts and dark desires begin to surface, leading to a gripping and intense battle for power. This year’s Lower School production promises to be a haunting and thrilling experience.
It is our pleasure to have OVs, Ben Pearson and Alfie Dackombe, return with a two-hander and the Drama Hut will be home to a small cast who perform a love letter to London, City Stories – a new type of cabaret drama elegantly written and beautifully constructed by James Phillips.
Sixth Formers direct their set text The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, developing their work from House Drama with an ensemble cast. Year 10 Drama pupils will perform Mark Ravenhill’s Pool No Water, a visceral and shocking play about the fragility of friendship and the jealousy and resentment inspired by success. Using Berkoff’s physical approach, this will not be for the feint hearted!
Each afternoon there will also be a variety of workshops with visiting practitioners to choose from. These include Emma Rice’s Wise Children Musical Storytelling, Drumming, Swing Dance, Clowning with Monty Dent, Acting for Camera with East London’s Collective Acting Studio, West End Songs with Musical Director, Bobby Goulder and a Poetry Slam.
We hope that this exciting programme is varied enough that each pupil will find new things to learn and think about. If pupils are keen to put something on that we haven’t thought about or form a production team to publicise and document in the run up, we want to hear from them! Mr Robertson is hoping to get our Radio station going with the addition of the new desk and Weymouth English Department will become a hub for an online Editorial, Vlogs and Reviews. The Art Department will be open for pupils to design posters and look forward to welcoming you to their annual Imagine Exhibition from 6:30pm each evening. More details to follow on how to book evening shows.
Emily Harris, Director of Drama