YTYT…What is your profession?

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To finish off the blogs of 2009 I thought I would (gloat) celebrate about what we’ve done particularly well this year…so here goes…

1. We’re still here…

Pretty obvious you might say but actually it’s been much trickier than you might imagine…the youth theatre has no money of its own and at the moment no funding…it relies on the generosity of its sister company Yew Tree Arts Ltd to subsidise the money you pay each week in order to keep going. This hasn’t been a major issue in the past but when the recession hit it’s been harder to sustain everything and anything…especially when the rent we pay to venues keeps increasing…so the fact that we’ve made it through deserves a Robert Girgis style round of applause…

2. We still know what we stand for…

As organisations get bigger and more well known quite often they can lose sight of why they began in the first place…we still have at our centre the desire to create a space that is safe and inclusive, a place to play and to be creative; equally a place where youth theatre members can develop in whatever way they deem valuable – as an actor, in their ability to share or to see from different perspectives, in their journey to become more confident or simply more successful holistically…

3. We’re not afraid to take a risk…

Renting a 300 seater theatre for 2 nights to perform our Christmas shows was a risk, devoting a whole weekend to Shakespeare was a risk, choosing, “The Heights” as our Connections play and performing it at The West Yorkshire Playhouse was a risk, The Green Company taking on their first full length play was a risk, writing and rehearsing an original piece of theatre in 3 weeks to perform at Nostell Priory in the summer was a risk…and in every production we do…in many of the workshops even…individual members of the youth theatre are taking risks left right and centre…thing is…we’re not scared…and on the few occasions we are…we’re not on our own… so it’s all good…

4. We celebrate success…

This is such an integral part of the fabric of Yew Tree Youth Theatre…when we achieve something we enjoy a sense of achievement…in the way we talk to each other, in the smiles and laughter that follows and in the lasting legacy of the forums, blogs and fan pages…

5. We’re ambitious…

So we had a good 2009 and we’re rightly impressed with ourselves…but 2010 is going to be even better…the plans are already afoot for a brilliant year…with Sparkleshark about to go into rehearsals, another Shakespeare Festival on the cards and a term of creativity planned for each and every group that belongs to this ever growing, ever developing, ever braver community…so yeah…hurray for that…

Thank you everyone who made 2009 the wonder it was and I look forward to working with you in the year to come…

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