Summer celebration blog by Ellie
So what a weekend we’ve had at yew tree!! LAMDA exams on Saturday where I took my grade 7, and then the Summer Celebration on Sunday and it’s safe to say the days festivities were an absolute joy!!
So my very busy Yew Tree week starts off on a Monday volunteering at Sapphire company, where they were having their last rehearsal of “The Audition” a play based on an audition for Romeo and Juliet, with themes of revenge, competition and jealousy, the cast were up to the challenge. Sitting at my little sound desk (AKA Sarah’s computer and an amp) you could just see the determination in the group to perfect their piece. The simple use of just one song “I hope I get it” being repeated really allowed the narrative to be more focused.
Then my first rehearsal of Tuesday night was “Standardisation” written by Gold companies own Becky Holderness and directed by Helena Wilkinson. Working on this piece has been interesting for me to work with a writer and director other than Sarah within Yew Tree, and wow it was an experience! The cast and I absolutely loved creating the play and developing the characters to make them our own, and I personally find it funny to say that the hardest part of this process was finding some handcuffs to arrest the character of Miss Badgers. We really worked on fine tuning the scenes of the play and character relationships to allow a more believable story to be portrayed on stage.
The second rehearsal of my Tuesday night was “Are We Going For A Spin?” A show inspired by the stories of the residents at Outwood Grange and Lodge care home from back in their day after the war and how they used to go dancing. We worked on re-piecing the play back together as we had left it for a while since the short show we did for the residents themselves back at the end of May.
Then on Wednesday I go on to volunteering at Jade company who performed “Where The Wild Things Are” and the rehearsal was magic! To say the children are one of the youngest groups they really worked hard to make their play special and I must give massive credit to Tom for directing the play, and doing an amazing job!!
Thursday nights start off with Orange company and they were working on “Stardust” and “Dogs Don’t Do Ballet”, speaking on the behalf of Ben, Jacob and I, we were so immensely proud of them in the show! They really pulled together and put on two great pieces!! My night finishes off with black company in a rehearsal of “Fear and Misery in the third Reich” by Brecht. A full length show to be put on this Sunday at 1pm if you’re free! But we performed a nice taster of the show at the celebration and it seemed to be a hit!! I’m so excited!
Friday night consisted of a LAMDA lesson to prepare me for my exam on the Saturday, another run of “Standardisation” for Gold company members, and then a gold company rehearsal of “Am I?” A piece on identity and fitting in. A play that really delved into people’s mind sets and how moving into new things changes a persons perspective on things. I loved putting Am I? Together as it was such a challenge to get the subject matter right without being too self indulgent, whilst still getting the message across!
On Saturday 8 of us sat our LAMDA exams, another challenge with the summer celebration being the next day, but it was a task we all dived head first into! Each of us coming out with smiley faces feeling like we’d achieved exactly what we wanted to felt amazing! Just another 6 weeks to wait for the results now!!
The show on Sunday was an absolute success! A triumph! The week leading up to the show was a long haul for me with being busy every single day and being on work experience as well as all my rehearsals, but I’m so happy with how the show went. Ranging from 4-24 year olds, 3 shows, 10 companies, lamda solos, duets, you name it we did it all. And yes, we did pull it off!
If you want some photographic evidence of the day get yourself onto the Yew Tree Youth Theatre Facebook page to see the photos by the wonderful Ellie!
So what a weekend we’ve had at yew tree!! LAMDA exams on Saturday where I took my grade 7, and then the Summer Celebration on Sunday and it’s safe to say the days festivities were an absolute joy!!
So my very busy Yew Tree week starts off on a Monday volunteering at Sapphire company, where they were having their last rehearsal of “The Audition” a play based on an audition for Romeo and Juliet, with themes of revenge, competition and jealousy, the cast were up to the challenge. Sitting at my little sound desk (AKA Sarah’s computer and an amp) you could just see the determination in the group to perfect their piece. The simple use of just one song “I hope I get it” being repeated really allowed the narrative to be more focused.
Then my first rehearsal of Tuesday night was “Standardisation” written by Gold companies own Becky Holderness and directed by Helena Wilkinson. Working on this piece has been interesting for me to work with a writer and director other than Sarah within Yew Tree, and wow it was an experience! The cast and I absolutely loved creating the play and developing the characters to make them our own, and I personally find it funny to say that the hardest part of this process was finding some handcuffs to arrest the character of Miss Badgers. We really worked on fine tuning the scenes of the play and character relationships to allow a more believable story to be portrayed on stage.
The second rehearsal of my Tuesday night was “Are We Going For A Spin?” A show inspired by the stories of the residents at Outwood Grange and Lodge care home from back in their day after the war and how they used to go dancing. We worked on re-piecing the play back together as we had left it for a while since the short show we did for the residents themselves back at the end of May.
Then on Wednesday I go on to volunteering at Jade company who performed “Where The Wild Things Are” and the rehearsal was magic! To say the children are one of the youngest groups they really worked hard to make their play special and I must give massive credit to Tom for directing the play, and doing an amazing job!!
Thursday nights start off with Orange company and they were working on “Stardust” and “Dogs Don’t Do Ballet”, speaking on the behalf of Ben, Jacob and I, we were so immensely proud of them in the show! They really pulled together and put on two great pieces!! My night finishes off with black company in a rehearsal of “Fear and Misery in the third Reich” by Brecht. A full length show to be put on this Sunday at 1pm if you’re free! But we performed a nice taster of the show at the celebration and it seemed to be a hit!! I’m so excited!
Friday night consisted of a LAMDA lesson to prepare me for my exam on the Saturday, another run of “Standardisation” for Gold company members, and then a gold company rehearsal of “Am I?” A piece on identity and fitting in. A play that really delved into people’s mind sets and how moving into new things changes a persons perspective on things. I loved putting Am I? Together as it was such a challenge to get the subject matter right without being too self indulgent, whilst still getting the message across!
On Saturday 8 of us sat our LAMDA exams, another challenge with the summer celebration being the next day, but it was a task we all dived head first into! Each of us coming out with smiley faces feeling like we’d achieved exactly what we wanted to felt amazing! Just another 6 weeks to wait for the results now!!
The show on Sunday was an absolute success! A triumph! The week leading up to the show was a long haul for me with being busy every single day and being on work experience as well as all my rehearsals, but I’m so happy with how the show went. Ranging from 4-24 year olds, 3 shows, 10 companies, lamda solos, duets, you name it we did it all. And yes, we did pull it off!
If you want some photographic evidence of the day get yourself onto the Yew Tree Youth Theatre Facebook page to see the photos by the wonderful Ellie!
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