-
And this lovely blog is from Rachel Johnson...who we are delighted to have had back for a little while before she heads to London in the New Year to perform in a show she and her company have created...

So after three years at Uni I'm back in good old Wakefield and the last couple of weeks have been especially nice getting involved in another yew tree project, seeing vampire story and just generally being around the team again after so long!  
Being asked to write this blog made me think back to when I first left Yew Tree to start Uni back in 2011. I clearly remember feeling very lost and unsettled while I was in my first term at Warwick and then coming back to Wakefield for my first weekend visit since leaving. I went to a gold company session while I was back and I remember feeling so at home again and comfortable and happy there and everything and everyone was familiar and I really did not want to go back to uni after that! It's funny because, after three years of getting properly settled into university, that has become the place I associate with as home, and now that I've graduated and moved back to Wakefield with no grand plan of what's coming up next, it's here that I actually feel those lost and unsettled feelings I'd had three years ago! But what's lovely in all of this is that when I went back to Sarah and Gemma to work on a yew tree project the other week, (and got to spend an evening catching up with some Yew Tree members), I felt that settled and at home feeling again, straight away, the same I'd had when I visited that gold company session years ago. And trust me, feeling part of something familiar like that is such a relief when you're in this weird just graduated don't know what I'm doing with my life stage! Yew tree will always have that welcoming, almost community/ family feeling to it and it's so nice to know that whether I'm hundreds of miles away or just a car ride away, Yew Tree will always be a place where you feel at home.
Anyway, less of the soppiness. The project I worked on with Yew Tree was a conference for people who work in the mental health sector for the NHS. The short script we performed then prompted a discussion with these workers. The discussion itself was so interesting and it was lovely to hear that people ranging from drama therapists to clinical psychologists believed we really captured a lot of their thoughts and feelings within the piece. It was so good to be back working on something practical and getting into a bit of straight script acting again after so long, although actually pretty scary too!
Aaand finally, I'm gonna wrap it up with just mentioning Vampire Story that I saw the other night. I never saw the play when Yew Tree did it the first time round for connections so it was completely fresh for me unlike some the people who I went to see it with who performed in the original one. The play itself was a really brave choice and quite harrowing at times! It was nice to see lots of fresh faces and there were some very impressive performances from people I've never seen before (as well as from old members of course)! Well done Yew Tree and have a well deserved Christmas and see you all soon!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chloe's Leavers Blog - finally :)

-
  Please excuse how this was written, I do a very silly drama school course, and I haven’t had to write more than my name in 9 months. I’m sat in my silly dorm bed writing me this on my DSA laptop (a win for the mentally ill girlies), realising how utterly bad my ability to Words has become. Anyway.. Leaving YTYT was one of the oddest experiences of my life, and yet, I don’t remember it at all. I’d spent the last few years, waving off some of my closest friends as they went on to conquer their dreams, in a tearful circle, yet all I have is a fuzzy memory and a video saved in an instagram highlight. I’d sell a kidney to try and bring back that experience, to do my final show unclouded by new medication and intrusive thoughts, but as that isn’t possible, I thought I’d finally write my leavers blog, even if it is a year late. I started Yew Tree in 2017, as a way to explore drama outside of the agonising GCSE setting, and across the years, it became a lifeline for me, providing confidence,
Read more

Arwen's Leavers blog

-
I made a start writing this leaver’s blog when I was on a bloody needed holiday over a month ago, on the glorious Isle of Islay in Scotland. I’m re-writing it now, because I think it was naff to be honest. And I’m not in the same mindset as I was then. Also I might have had a few too many drams of whisky whilst writing it there, so there’s that. A line I’ll keep from it however is: “How am I meant to do justice and summarise in my writing the enormity of an impact that Yewtree has had on me these last 5-ish years?” How can I articulate all the skills that I've learnt and developed? The experiences I’ve had? There’s so much, where and what do I start on? So I’ll do just that, and put some of the skills I’ve learnt into use: “You can’t be a creative, a critic, and an editor at the same time” But in fairness - I don’t think I could share and articulate all those things. And I’m not sure that I want to, they’re for me. I can’t put that expectation on myself. The past year I’ve felt as
Read more

Celebrating the past in the present...

-
  Next year Yew Tree Youth Theatre will be 30 years old.   We haven’t quite decided how we will celebrate - any suggestions would be gratefully received. No doubt there will be some nostalgic perambulating down memory lane and some haphazard but joyous celebrating of three decades of creativity we have shared.   Some variation of those two themes would feel fitting. This blog however is something different. This blog is a celebration of the present of those who attended YTYT in the past. Alumni, graduates, previous members – I can never seem to find the right term – but whatever word is chosen I know for sure they are part of the fabric of the youth theatre and I’m grateful to have known all of them, mainly because I have learnt so much from them.   I also can’t put a number on how many people have spent significant time with YTYT over the last 29 years.   I know we started with a group of 8 and now have about 80 members, I know at our peak just before COVID we had about 130 young pe
Read more