Nathan's Leavers Blog

 I think this is the first leavers blog that Sarah has received where the person writing it doesn’t like acting. But, I’m writing this because I partially feel obligated to. You would too if you made someone deal with your less than enthusiastic personality every week for 4 ish years (maybe more, I can’t remember). I’ve been at Yew Tree for a few years. I haven’t been there for as long as some people but I believe I’ve certainly made an impression as to how annoying I can be.

Anyways, down to it. I remember joining yew tree because my sister bullied me into going and then got annoyed at me for going (Lucy protests this statement, however her opinion doesn’t matter here). I did my first Christmas show and was thrown in at the deep end with an exceptionally large part of Captain of the Guard with a magnificent three lines. A very difficult three lines. Trust me. They were almost all over 4 words each. Almost. Much to my dismay, this was not the end of my acting career. As my sister whined and moaned until I agreed to attend the audition of Ceasefire Babies with nothing prepared, having not even read the script. And from this lack of preparation I was gifted the part of Johnny. My favourite part of being in Ceasefire Babies was building friendships while working alongside everyone. My favourite scene in the play was the Wall scene with Dec and Connor. The actual sitting was awful however it was worth it to make such an impactful scene. To this day I still can’t sit still for any length of time so who knows how I managed to on stage. And then to the surprise of many a people (particularly from my high school) we went to the National Theatre in London. My favourite part about this was not the acting. Honestly, the acting was my least favourite thing about the whole week. I mean backstage was great, the wall was kinda cool (I very much liked jumping over it) and I got a wig that made me look like Shaggy from Scooby Doo. No, what I loved about this experience was the celebration takeaway with the boys in the hotel afterwards and wasting an unhealthy amount of time on Pokemon Go. Also, there were pancakes at breakfast which is always a win. So, I discovered I didn’t really like acting, so I retired, after another Christmas Show where I complained incessantly. So my last year and a bit of Yew Tree was spent behind the scenes, thankfully. I got the clips together for Radio, Black Company’s show about WW2. And Sarah didn’t even mind that much, emphasis on much, that the clips were often quite last minute. So I did that and then did my last Christmas Show, where I pressed play for Black Company’s ‘Radio’ performance, did sound for Gold Company’s ‘Beauty and the Beast’ (hands down the most stressful thing I’ve ever done, not including acting) and the lighting for Black Company’s ‘Is This Christmas?’ (written by Taylor Caddick). ‘Is This Christmas?’ was a lot of fun, if not a bit more work than I was expecting. Overall, I preferred being behind the scenes than being on the stage. So my time at Yew Tree has taught me many a things, like how to frustrate Sarah to no end with my persistence to not want to play games. Except Party Quirks, that one was tolerable. I also learnt how to not annoy Sarah, but I rarely utilised this knowledge. I learnt to be a bit more trusting and to put myself out there a bit more. I think there’s only one way to end this and that’s to say thanks for putting up with me Sarah and Oz for the lighting tips. Thanks to everyone at Yew Tree that’s made me feel welcome and in a way made me who I am today. And thanks, these past few years have been alright thanks to you all.