What's happening at YTYT

Emma Fretwell Ladies and Gentlemen... I haven’t blogged for ages and ages but it’s a pleasure to be doing one today. Recently I’ve joined Black Company and we’re doing Comedy of Errors… we’ve started the read-through and we had pizza for Danny’s birthday and it was all very lovely. We watched a film made by some film students about Black Company and it’s so well put together… The film itself is a fab advertisement for Yew Tree and if you haven’t watched it yet then you should. And you should share it on Facebook. And copy and paste the link onto your Twitters or your Tumblrs or whatever. There’s no reason why everyone in the world shouldn’t see it because it’s so positive and nice. So get it watched.   At Gold Company we’ve been (on and off) working on some Chekhov scripts. This Saturday we watched one of them performed by Lucy, James and Josh – it was really something. They had complete control and understanding of it, we were all extremely entertained and I wish I’d had chance to

This week India asked me to answer some questions for an assignment she's writing on the relationship between actors and director...I thought I'd share my answers as this weeks blog... 1.   As an actress who decided to run their own theatre company and become a director, what sort of relationship do you wish to achieve with the young actors you work with? It’s a complicated balance of many things.   I want actors to feel safe in my workshop or rehearsal room so that they can be brave and are able to try new things but too much safety and there is a danger that actors become blasé and feel like they don’t need to try.   I want them to feel able to play but know when playfulness needs to shift into disciplined work.   The relationship between actor and director has to be a positive one built on mutual respect.   They can do things to make the production successful that I can’t, they are an invaluable and precious resource.   Equally I have a position in the proc

The Circle Game. - Gemma Whelan There is a stunning song by the legendary Joni Mitchell called the circle game. The song paints a beautiful picture about how life carousels round, and that as long you are part of the ride life will pull you through the seasons of your life with a steady   certainty that's reassuring and dilutes the fear that comes with change. Tuesday was the first day of spring and the world seemed to take a breath, opens its windows, peg the washing on the line and throw caution to the wind by omitting socks and donning sandals, and revealing pale forearms to try and grab some Vitamin D. Much like a yawn this infectious optimism seeps into all aspects of my world, from the fresh whites billowing on my washing line to the high energy of my youth theatre sessions. Yesterday alone saw the joys of the Red company set off in search of a bear, Purple mash up fairy tales, and Crimson admirably fall in love and hate Shakespeare in equal measures.   What drew me to write

Over the past few weeks I have witnessed some of the best and most consistent devising I have ever seen and it’s been happening throughout the work of all of my companies.   There has been so much fantastic stuff that has delighted not only me but all of the audience who were lucky enough to witness it.     Workshops, whether they have been exploring farcical comedy or the lives of the fictional street we have created, have produced theatre of a truly excellent quality. I spend a lot of time in these sessions pointing out the things that were good about the work.     I concentrate on what was done successfully as I am a firm believer in positive reinforcement being the most powerful force in education and development.     However I thought I’d use the opportunity of this weeks blog to highlight a number of mistakes that can stop devised work reaching it’s full potential in the hope that it might enhance our work in this field even further…I hope you’ll take them in the po

Alex from Gold has contributed this weeks guest blog... There's a saying that goes 'From the sublime to the ridiculous is but a step.' Of course, anyone who has ever spent a reasonable amount of their time at Yew Tree Youth Theatre knows that this is total nonsense. So often there, the ridiculous IS the sublime. At Gold this weekend, after rounds of absolutely mad but absolutely brilliant games of Ninja Warrior, Amoeba and others, we were set a small devising task - a 2 minute scene set in a library in which all lines had to be questions. But groups still managed to include lines like 'Do you need cheaper car insurance?' and 'Can you feel the love tonight?'. All, of course, making perfect sense in the context of these short pieces. Well, almost perfect sense anyway. For our main task, we continued, from last week, to be split into two sets, one developing their takes on a Chekhov farce, and another couple of groups working on their own short scen

This week has all felt a bit like a roller coaster…there have been great highs and real challenges…lovely moments and difficult decisions…victories and losses.   It’s hard at times like this to keep hold of the bigger picture indeed there have been times during the last seven days when I’ve felt like I was lurching from one critical incident to another and this always unnerves me as it’s a dangerous position to be in.   Living in the moment like this means you lose sight of the journey you are on, the things you are learning on the way and the things that each step teaches you regardless of whether the current one goes in your favour.   At YTYT this week the casting for the two Shakespeare plays has either been done or is imminent…the coin has been flipped for which cast goes to Kendal and lots of drama school auditions and prep.   Of course there have been and will be disappointments, of course amongst the happy faces of those who have got what they want there are those

So here I am, Danny Bell - remember the name – bahaha – writing a blog of all things. Gold company inspired me to do so this morning. I feel a little like Peter Brook in his introduction to Grotowski’s ‘Towards a Poor Theatre’ in that I don’t want to discuss the work we undertook in the room for fear it will be broken or misrepresented. So I’ll follow in his footsteps and allude to the work and try draw out some more general points that are perhaps more accessible. Gold Company are embarking on a journey into farce, specifically looking at Chekov’s ‘The Bear’ and ‘The Proposal’ however that journey has literally just begun with read throughs today so I’ll leave that and concentrate on the creative task that was set for the other half of the company who haven’t yet acquired their scripts.   Neatly combining Black and Gold’s themes of farce and mistaken identity (It’s worth noting that last week’s plays on mistaken identity were excellent) this week’s creative task was creating a play a

This week at Yew Tree has been all about play as a reward for the hard work that went into Spirit of the Landscape and Journey to X and it’s turned out to be a perfect and joyful reward.   In Sapphire we had 2 full on rounds of situation wink murder and in both Black and Gold we spent the time we weren’t trying to pull something together for The Hepworth’s Zombie walk exploring awkward situations and mistaken identity and trying to get out of a fix…I even agreed to play park bench…TWICE!   I was utterly entertained by your response to the creative tasks, such creative scenarios, such a good balance of word play and physical humour, the clever capturing of an environment in the sort of clear short hand that allows the audience to enter into the spirit of the scene effortlessly…you really are the most delightfully witty group of actors… Youth Theatre sessions this week were full of laughter which with all the stress and challenges you tell me about in best and worst see

James Loughlin has kindly blogged about last weeks performances Due to there being no-one from Journey to X writing a blog for last week’s performance I thought I’d come along and tell you all about and add an extra mention about the Black Companies performances of Spirit of the Landscape. Last week everything else seemed to have come to a standstill and all focus and attention was focussed on that of the performances of Journey to X. It was a week of greater discoveries, overcoming obvious obstacles and great success (and I’m talking about both Journey to X and Spirit of the Landscape). We had very strong performances with many of our friends and families coming to see our hard work we had put in over the past few months, with each cast improving on the last performances meaning that we wouldn’t become comfortable with our performance but strive to make it better and push the boundary in each scene. We have attained brilliant feedback from all that saw it and we tha