DRAMA
T he politically themed Middle School House Drama Festival ignited boys’ imaginations as they embraced the notion of the theatre as a forum for debate. Congratulations to all boys involved for an inventive and impressive evening and a very mature treatment of and response to some very challenging and difficult subject-matter. We were treated to adaptations of screen drama or comedy dealing with current political life — Veep , House of Cards and a Life of Brian adaptation; two pieces dealing with war — Black Watch and 946 — The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips ; Ink , a piece about the rise of Rupert Murdoch, Refugee Boy , looking at the immigration issue and The Kite Runner , a powerful piece set in 1970s Afghanistan. I was bowled over that the boys had chosen, cast, rehearsed, tech-ed and performed the pieces with the minimum of help from teachers, so much so that I had to keep asking - did the boys really do all this on their own? The choices were sophisticated and varied, and the standard of stagecraft across the board was very high. The evening began with The Kite Runner , adapted and directed by Henry Wallder. It was impressive for the fluidity of its staging, seamlessly moving from one location to another, creating different atmospheres and confidently
Middle School House Drama Political Theatre
Dan Milne, adjudicator
handling different theatrical forms. This story was told through a mixture of dialogue scenes, direct address storytelling to the audience, physical chorus work, and atmospheric company scenes. I would encourage these theatre makers to keep being bold in developing these varied elements of storytelling. This was followed by two fun adaptations from the screen — What has Europe Done for Us , Joshua Cunningham-Barrett and Gabriel Proctor’s witty transposing of a Life of Brian sketch to a Brexit debate, and Jack Probert’s theatricalisation of a Veep episode. It was bold and enjoyable to see these two familiar pieces re-imagined by the students and they rose well to the challenge of converting from screen to stage. The first adaptation gave us ambitious impersonations of Theresa May and Diane Abbott, with a lovely cameo from Jean-Claude Juncker. The second managed to give us an economical telling of a whole Veep episode with some clever staging to achieve what ‘cutting’ back and forth can do so easily on the screen. Comedy is always challenging, but they both chose well-written pieces and managed to pull off some good comic repartee. The first half was rounded off with 946 , directed by Isaac Gleave, who also brought great presence to his performance as Bluesman, the narrator. There was a very pleasing visual simplicity to the design and presentation of this piece, with some inventive staging, bringing to life elements of the story like the sinking of the boats with beautiful clarity.
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