What's happening at YTYT

“I would have preferred to see our version of The Musicians,” so said Mr Jonathan Hopwood as we were discussing the West End production of Little Voice…and although I accused him of being biased I couldn’t help feeling the same…I was also feeling pretty disillusioned about watching professional theatre as the production had been nothing more than mediocre. There ensued a reasonably lengthy debate about what had gone wrong. Why hadn’t we cared about the alcoholic, struggling mother and her emotionally challenged daughter? Why hadn’t we been entertained by the story of the working class struggling to realise their dreams? Why was the only thing that we agreed was good; the set? The answer became clear during discussion, the production had lost sight of what it wanted to be and what it wanted to say and in doing so it had become a bland montage of moments…some more memorable than others…but in the end unfulfilling… and that’s a shame…especially at the price per ticket it is being sold f...

To celebrate the fact that we have Ellie back for a little while I asked her to write the blog...and here it is in all it's thoughtful glory... 2010 has already been a year of huge upheaval for me. Saying goodbye to Edinburgh and all the wonderful friends I had there still gives me a knot in my stomach. Regardless of the fact that they are both only a train journey away it’s still not the same as being amongst them everyday. And being back home has all changed too. Not only is Wakefield covered in new buildings and gaping holes where I thought other things should be, but so many of the people I was hoping to see have all gone too! However, it was lovely to have the Black Company to come back to and it I was both nervous and excited about what the new term would bring. Without the safety net of Chinazo and Poppy and Nadz, I was feeling slightly uneasy. Although, it was lovely to see some old faces I felt nonetheless daunted by a group that had been working together week after week w...

I love the fact that whatever task we hit the youth theatre they rise to the challenge with brilliant results. Sapphire company…create clowning duets based around a chair…30 minutes later…done…brilliantly…Black company…create scenes based on a theatrical genre and three words…45 minutes later…done…and done to a standard that some moments in the performances took my breath away…Gold company…create scenes inspired by a structured improvisation by developing the characters and their history…45 minutes later…done…and in the process a number of stories that made me want to sit down and write the full scripts for them were created. Sparkleshark casts (yes there’s two of them) stage the first 16 pages by the end of the third rehearsal…done…with characters taking shape and an atmosphere built that promises a brilliant rehearsal process… However I think one of the greatest challenges this week was faced by the Karamazoo cast…actors…perform the first two pages of a solo show in front of 23 peo...

Marvelous Micheal Brown this week with a blog that made me smile more than once I've got to love Mondays. Because that’s the day I go to my Yew Tree group! Every single Monday morning I wake up an and think to myself, "Ugh, the weekends over, school today. But oh wait! I've got Yew Tree tonight!" That’s really the main thing that gets me through the challenges of Monday and when you finally arrive at Yew Tree there is never a dull moment! After laughing at the stories of best and worst of the week (which is personally one of my favourite bits) we always play an amazing game to get the ball rolling. After that...we do some thing else. This week we did clowning, which was utterly hilarious! The idea was to act like we really wanted to sit in a chair; we were paired up and came up with short clown sketches of two people wanting to sit on a chair. Everyone loved it! And Matt and Jake's; rock, paper, sit on the chair anyway! Timeless. If you were to stop reading my ...

Orrrrrrrr mannnnn….What do I choose?....Where do I start? The first workshops for every company have been delightful, creative and to quote the Egyptian “A pleasure.” There has been so so much that could be classed as blogworthy…I’m honestly struggling…I think I’m going to pick up on two moments… one that reaffirmed something basic and a moment where I made a discovery that motivated me to reassess something I thought I had a complete handle on... So the first one…I had the gold company work on some 4 line scenes…an exercise entirely stolen from a practitioner I admire but then adapted for use in youth theatre…it entailed giving pairs of actors a 4 line scene (the title gave it away really) and then getting them to build the entire story within which this fraction of a scene existed. Getting people to dig this deep was a tough call the first week back but the results were fascinating…there were a number of memorable performances but the one that really stood out was Ash…his simplici...

India has returned inspired by my beautiful book of blogs with an insight into the first black company rehearsal of the year Okay, so I volunteered to write this week’s blog after being inspired by the previous week’s bloggers but I really don’t know where to start. I apologise in advance if it turns out to be just rambling garbage! This isn’t my first blog but last time I cheated and copied a diary entry so this time I want to do it properly, so it could be called my first. Feel my self rambling now because I can’t really think of anything half as good to put as previous blogs have been on what to talk about… then, like a guardian angel… Aaron the master of guest blogging popped up on Facebook chat and I asked him for a few tips on what to write about, he suggested that I write like I was telling someone about what I think of the initial ideas for the new project, like a drama logbook, so that’s what I’m going to do :) Today at Yew Tree we started with the classic best and worst and t...

It’s been a snow week made up of many snow days and the effect of this on people has been fascinating…some have railed against it…but most have delighted in it…at least at first…and some have used it as an excuse to unhook from their ordinary lives. I’ve been amused at how quickly the novelty and delight wore off for some people…what was magical on Tuesday became the worst thing in the world by Thursday but I’ve been greatly intrigued by how quickly people assumed they had an absolute right to this time “unhooked” from their real lives. There is something about human nature that when something is offered, something nobody saw coming, all too soon it seen as something they are entitled to. Having Tuesday off was a complete bonus and then for most people Wednesday was thrown in as well…what good luck…who would have foreseen the reaction of anguish and indignation that ensued when people had to go back to school/college/work – whatever represented real life for them on Thursday or Frida...

The incredibly valuable and valued Gemma Whelan...with a lovely blog that echos the thoughts of the Yew Tree artists as we get ready to start the term... So the last year has been put to bed and the new one has begun, and it’s full of promise, opportunity and youth theatre, and so we begin the joyous journey that rockets through the rollercoaster of the next 12 months, with highs, lows and moments of complete bewilderment when I look at the people around me and I say who am I and why am I here? But would I get off? Nah! not for all the tea in china. Also I have a grand master plan for what I what I would like to explore this next year, which I can’t completely divulge because if I did I would…..have…to…..stick to it, which is a dangerous place for a practitioner to be, as we need to be flexible when we’re exploring young peoples imagination and realms of their confidence. I can tell you though that there will be a appearance of King Lear, chunks of slow motion action from The Tempest. ...

Aaron has the first guest blog slot of the year with a brilliant review of 2009...if you were nice people you would add to his memories by commenting on here or the forum blog thread or the link on facebook...he's written 5 blogs... a comment or two from the rest of the Youth Theatre isn't too much to ask...that's all I'm saying... Well it’s me again. I hope that everyone has had a brilliant Christmas and a great New Year celebration of some form. So the first blog of the year, first blog of the decade even. I thought it might be nice to go over some of my fond Yew Tree memories of 2009 (sorry if you aren’t in them.) The amount of productions that I’ve been in with Yew Tree in the space of a year is fairly amazing in my opinion, as to how a group of people are able to work together so well and how much we have gotten done with no arguments. This was the year that we performed our connections piece ‘The Heights’ at different venues around Wakefield and at the West Yorksh...

In addition to the eating up of festive fayre and recovering from the excesses of Christmas, in addition to the heralding of the new decade and the bidding of farewells to 2009, this week also witnessed the first rehearsal of Sparkleshark… And what a joyous occasion that was…so many faces, voices, minds and ideas brought together and now joined together by a single purpose – to realise the work of fiction that is Sparkleshark… Now when I say single purpose the impression given might be a little misleading… There is nothing uniform about the company of actors that have put themselves forward for this task. Over the course of the first day of rehearsals what became clear is that this is a cast full of opinions and the desire to air them, in fact even when there is no real opinion they undeterred…oh yes…they still like to say something…anything in fact…isn’t that right Aliceproudownerofatworoomcellar? This however is a good thing…a very good thing…as I am confident to enough to believe ...