What's happening at YTYT

This is an additional blog - the narrative of Scarlet Company's physical theatre piece for the Christmas shows...I was inspired and thought they might like to see their story in print...scroll down for my mainstream blog of this week - readiness... She knew it wasn’t going to be easy – committing to a career in dance was infamously difficult – she knew there were no short cuts…that every inch of progression was only achievable through hard work…but she was prepared to do it…prepared to work as hard as she could because of how dancing felt when she was truly absorbed by it…when she allowed herself to be entirely enslaved to it… To move, to leap, to fly, to glide, to dance, To connect with every living soul. No feeling like it, all thought entranced. Perfect placement, yet within the control Such freedom unfettered, beyond compare. Alive from finger tips to the ends of feet, Ev’ry nerve, ev’ry sinew, entirely aware, Knowing in that moment you are complete. A ...

Today’s blog is inspired by Alice …who has blogged twice for YTYT at the tender age of 7 and who I spotted at the start of yesterday’s run of Aladdin, when most members of the cast were still chattering and settling, stood perfectly poised and entirely ready…she made me catch my breath such was her level of maturity and concentration.   She also made me think that readiness was a very useful thing to blog about… I talk a lot about being ready in my workshops – in my school work I talk about being ready to learn…in my work with professional organisations about being ready to take on new ideas, to see things from a new perspective and in my drama workshops and rehearsals about being ready to work wholeheartedly and creatively…that actors should be ready to give themselves over to the process of making theatre… It is of course like so many things easier said than done but it makes a big difference when readiness is present – whatever the context – it means that the people in ...

Alice Narey (not the little Alice of my blog - a slightly older but none the less delightful one) is our guest blogger this week: It finally feels like November…Halloween and bonfire night is done, the John Lewis   advert has aired and it's now socially acceptable to mention Christmas. But most importantly, Yew Tree’s Christmas shows are well under way. This week me and Tom finished choreographing our epic sword fight (and trust me it is epic, if you want to see me stick a sword through my legs and somehow make it look cool I'd advise buying tickets) and we also   had the pleasure of showing it to the younger side of Yew Tree – as well as getting   a sneak preview of their own Christmas production and I can tell you it’s   looking adorable! Then, I was lured into helping out at Black Company at the offer of free cake…I’m a sucker for home baked goods. Turns out, that was a pretty good decision, I saw faces I haven't seen in way too long and it was so lovel...

Putting thoughts into words is tricky tonight as my head is overloaded…I’ve just finished an afternoon of dress rehearsals with WY Performers in preparation for their production of Aladdin which happens in less than a fortnight…it’s looking so good…as ever it’s a delightful process to watch something I wrote so many months ago taking shape into a production that will entertain, engage and impress the many people that will come to see it on the 12 th and 13 th of November. It occurred to me as I watched today’s rehearsal that certain things set individual performers (of any age) apart in a production like this…the first is their desire to want to do well rather than an assumption that it will just happen…this however needs to be accompanied by graft as an actor and a dancer that is needed for them to know their lines and steps, understand what they mean and deliver them in a way that is true to the story and the character…this in turn has to be matched with a focus…an ability to ...

Emily is our guest Blogger this week! Well this week we've been very busy at Black company with staging The Snow Princess and I can now happily say we are 3/4 of the way through it and it promises to be a stunning piece! Due to doing the Miners Memorial commitments throughout July, September and October, we started the term on a slight disadvantage against other companies in sense of how much time we'd have to prepare our Christmas show piece. Challenge accepted? Definitely. Black company had an extra rehearsal 12pm until 3pm on Monday to consolidate what we had done in the previous Thursday's rehearsal, catch up anyone who was missing then finally stage the second page of script. Everyone caught up with ease and determination so we could move on to our festival celebration dancing. Yes, you heard me correctly, dancing. With not all of us having taken dance classes before, we spent a lot of time devising our pieces by taking ordinary everyday movements of young people/ch...

It's a beautiful autumnal morning full of golden light on turning trees, continuous cups of tea and a day with space in it stretching out in front of me...the temptation to spend this blog waxing lyrical cliches in homage to seasonal Sunday loveliness is ever so tempting but I have a more practical purpose... I'm going to try and help with the whole line learning business - it's that time in the Autumn term when the Christmas plays need you to confidently and clearly have your lines committed to memory.   It's tricky but it's eminently achievable and the sooner it's done the better the play will be...so here goes...5 top things to remember about learning lines... 1.   Learning lines takes time - you need to set a part lots of short pockets of it - not huge swathes of it - regular 15 minutes of ring feed time - a number of daily fixes - also be strategic - don't try and do the whole play at once - break it down into scenes - sections of scenes - get ...

I just love YEW TREE by Alice Kearford My experience with Black and Orange company, In Black Company were doing a show called The Snow Princess I am a snow flurry a village child and just for a bit the little snow princess. I love doing this show because it’s got snow in it and I love snow and I get to do it with my friends. When I was asked to help with Black Company I felt happy because I’ve never been asked to work with big people before. I find it good to work with big people so that I can learn things from them. Like if you have a line that’s saying that something is going on in the forest. They can show me how to do it .The big people make me feel welcome. By saying things like come here we’ll help you or they will show us what to do. In Orange Company we are doing a play called Santa Got Stuck up the Chimney, I am a star. It is a good show it is funny! My part is a star, we get to dance, I have lots of lines and a sparkly costume! We get the show at the Phoenix theatre,...