What's happening at YTYT

Amy Winder is one of our guest bloggers this week...she's a loyal and talented member of the Sapphire Company who are at present devising a piece to be performed on the 23rd of March...the theme is "The Circus" and the subject clowning...we're having the most fun... I didn’t like Mondays before I started drama, because at school we learn how not to swim (boring and easy) and we’re back at school after the weekend but now Mondays are brilliant. This week was absolutely hilarious, we were making a clown performance it was so fun. We had so many good ideas to choose from at the start the acting was so funny and at the end for that matter. Anyway it was brilliant all the ideas were so easy to remember and fun. It was my favourite session yet but I will probably find another favourite session. For some reason I find it much easier to think of ideas at drama when everyone is full of good ideas than I do at school. I love going to drama because everyone is so friendly. When

Sparkleshark is probably the most comedic show we have done for our Connections type project…and the journey we are making with it seems to be proving again and again that comedy takes as much, if not more, integrity than tragedy…maybe, in fact, it just illustrates a universal truth that all theatre requires utter integrity…I think, on reflection, this is probably the case… I kept getting nervous today in rehearsals…it was such a rollercoaster ride…as there was a lot of laughter throughout the rehearsal…and laughter always feels good…but not all of it was for the right reasons…at it’s best the laughter was inspired by the playwright and the play and the actors were simply a vehicle for that…they were a talented and able and technically adept vehicle but in these wonderful moments all of the elements were symbiotically enmeshed…actors were being brave and intelligent, creative and responsive…at it’s worse the audience were laughing at the actors themselves and the play instantly became

So Roberto Girgito here! Bad news it’s the end of connections week, I am wracked with so many emotions and thoughts however the selfish and most overwhelming one is the fact it’s my last... There is something so incredibly inspiring and beautiful in the fact that I spent one week with two incredibly smart, insightful, motivated and pleasurable directors without spending a penny. I am not saying everything has to have monetary value but it’s hard to come across people so dedicated in your development and wellbeing while saying ‘PUT YO DOLLAR BACK IN YO POCKET’...I tell a lie no-one at Yew Tree speaks like that. So let’s talk about the journey, I entered Monday like I enter any connections week, ‘How am I gonna do it justice’...’I will never be able to do this section’...’How on earth will this part work?’ Probably not the most healthy way to look at situations but that’s because Robert Girgis’s mind just operates like that. The beauty is though, I can keep at ease as I know every single

This week I have been thinking about…well many things really…it has been the week of all things Sparkleshark…but one of the things that has been at the front of my mind is that million dollar question of what makes good acting… I think this week broke once and for all the myth that, “You either have it or you don’t,” to quote a valued and veteran member of the company. This week has been testament to the fact that good acting comes from thought, courage and graft…it’s a fine balance of bravery, intelligence, instinct and responsiveness… with a pretty good shot of discipline and consideration too. The cast members who have really invested in the Sparkleshark process and the play have really seen their hard work pay off and it’s been a joy to behold. I think it’s important at this point to acknowledge what has been achieved in the last week or so…6 different performances well on their way to being pieces of theatre with class…the trick now is to continue the journey despite not being a

I write this on the train leaving Wakefield to spend a few days working for another Youth Theatre…and it feels really weird…spending time away from anything is an opportunity to be objective about the familiar…reevaluate…it’s taken me a little by surprise at how much I feel like I’m missing out by not being there to work with Gold Company on Saturday morning and having to wait until Wednesday to catch up with the Sparkleshark cast…the fact that Sapphire and Black company won’t be on for a week makes them less of a concern but I’ll definitely still miss our usual weekly check in…so this is a short blog (as I don’t want to take up your time when there are such brilliant guest blogs to read) to say that even tho the Black company can be difficult and contrary it is a wrench to go…Suffice to say Yew Tree Youth Theatre I shall miss you all collectively and individually…but I’m kind of enjoying that chance to come away and have broader horizons for a while… So yeah…it’s weird…but it’s good w

And third on the running order is Chelsey of the Gold and Black Company So this is my first blog…I’d like come up with millions of excuses as to why I haven’t written one up until now in fact I’m pretty sure I could write a whole blog of rubbish excuses but I’d rather just get straight to my point as I have far too much to say and not even all of it is getting used so here we go. My non Yew Tree friends generally can’t believe I get up so early on a Saturday morning and go to drama but this Saturday morning with the brilliant Gold Company reminded me why I do. A little creative task which is meant to be linked to the main task and just get us thinking creatively actually blew my mind and I could’ve spent the whole session and probably many weeks after that purely just thinking about what was gained from it. I also seem rather inspired by it but confusingly enough I’m not sure what I’m inspired to do luckily I’m blogging it so I may find out. So what happened for anyone who wasn’t there

Next up Sarah from the Black Company This term we’ve been devising. I love devising it reminds me of school and college but without the corniness. It allows you to forget about everything and go into a world that only you have created. The three devised pieces we have created over the past few weeks have been totally different and made me feel totally different after the experience. The first piece left me feeling so excited. I loved making the piece. The whole group were excited to keep the audience encaptured in our own little world that seemed so normal. But it wasn’t, it was a fairytale. The conversation after we all performed brought up so much discussion into what we see as a normal. How do you know what normal is? What’s normal to you may not be normal to someone else. It made me think how you can create a story but it can be perceived in so many different ways. The second piece affected me so differently. Sometimes you leave Yew Tree and you’re not directly affected by what you

Sam from the Sapphire Company with the first blog of the week... It’s five weeks since I started coming to Yew Tree and already it’s the main thought that get’s me through Mondays. Already I know Sarah and Danny, well maybe not Danny (sorry Dan only joking) mean business if they us set you a task then whatever it is happens and goes down brilliantly with everyone. While we are working at the task we have fun and laugh and before that we play some amazing games. Whereas at school for example if my class were asked to make one or two short plays a week to show to everyone else then it would not happen and if it did everyone would be grumpy and basically it would be rubbish and we would definitely not play any games! In the five weeks I have been at Yew Tree I have done so much it’s amazing and what’s even more amazing is the massive leap in confidence that follows the first couple of sessions. When you are performing once or twice in the space of two hours it really does make a differ

This morning at Gold Company we explored some universal truths and I was reminded once again of how important it is to explore and make discoveries about the world instead of just getting told what to think. It was an affirmation that true learning is a social event where ideas can be shared, new thoughts can be experimented with, old ideas can be debated, turned upside down and re-assimilated and conversation is vibrant, honest and non-judgemental. It is an open and inclusive process entirely at odds with the reductive nature of some mainstream education… It takes place in a world where people are allowed to take risks, allowed to fail and allowed to ask the stupid questions…and as such it is a refreshing, revitalising process… We were dealing with some big stuff this morning in our devising and in our writing…faith, war, politics, censorship, media, social networking…prevalent issues that it would be easy to say were too big for a group of young people attending a youth theatre to

Ash wrote a blog and it's very good...here it is I feel very inadequate that its taken me this long to write a blog. I would love to provide a justified reason, but the truth is the only thing that stopped me was my hindering ability to over think simple things, like best and worst of the week...Oh and I’m also quite lazy. I’m not going to write about this week at Yew Tree because I’m finding it hard to write about one definitive thing as there are thousands of thought evoking moments that occur at Yew Tree. If the blog had been running when I first joined, I could have easily written 200 words of aesthetically pleasing yet superficial content. These days, that’s not the case. This is because for me Yew Tree has brought so much more than I originally anticipated. It was when I was doing work experience that I realised just how much thought goes into everything and it changed the way I think in sessions. The most simple way I can put this is when we play games. It sometimes is a sha