Drama News!

We have had a very busy couple of months in the Drama department. We began March with our A Level practical performances – our Year 13 students challenged their audience with Brechtian explorations of topics as diverse as Hurricane Maria and American politics. Their duologues were taken from a range of plays from Antigone to Patrick Marber’s Closer. Year 11 students completed their practical exams entertaining an invited audience with duologues ranging from Oscar Wilde’s ‘Blythe Spirit’ to Simon Stephen’s adaptation of ‘The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time.’ All of these exam students impressed with their committed, engaging and moving performances.

Thank you to ex-Clement Danes students Georgia Andrews, Emma Smart and Jack Cansdale who ran workshops with our exam students sharing their knowledge and expertise! Georgia and Emma are studying at Central School of Speech and Drama and Jack is studying at Amersham College (when he’s not appearing in ‘Call the Midwife’!)

In a new venture there were ‘Pop-up’ Shakespeare performances in the LRC organised by our wonderful Drama Prefects Imogen Small and Rebecca Widdowson. Thank you for their efforts this year and to the all the students who took part – you made the Bard come to life in performance!

GCSE students enjoyed a performance of ‘The Woman in Black’ – they were impressed by this ghostly tale bought to life at the Fortune Theatre. The play was a master class in creating tension – evidenced by the blood curdling screams from the audience (and that was just Mr O’Dowd!)

A Level students were treated to an exciting revival of Caryl Churchill’s play ‘Top Girls’ at the National Theatre. Magnificent set designs and strong performances led to an outstanding of evening of challenging theatre.

Rehearsals are well under way for the Lower School Production of ‘Mary Poppins’ taking place in June . . . . more details to follow!

It has been brilliant to welcome back Mrs Golding who has been teaching the Lamda classes; as the students know, Mrs Golding is a professional voice artist. She will be leading a voice acting workshop at the female inspiring ‘Shout Out’ festival in London on May 18^th – please find the link below:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/shoutout-live-content-is-queen-womens-podcast-festival-tickets-58398555652?discount=EarlyBirdIWD&mc_eid=1ee1057069&mc_cid=8c334f2046

Mrs May - Performing Arts/Drama teacher