Drama

DRAMA REVIEW 2021-22

It has been quite a while since our boys have had the chance to tread the boards of our wonderful theatre at Merchiston. Due to the Covid pandemic, performances and close contact drama activities sadly had to be abandoned altogether. I am pleased to say that, this session, drama has finally made a long-awaited comeback, allowing pupils to improve their acting skills in the Lent and Summer Terms. The Junior Drama Club started in the Lent Term, giving boys from I to IV Form the chance to develop their performance skills, building confidence while working together as a team and, most importantly, having fun! The boys focussed on improvisation games and using movement, voice and physicality to create character. It was great to see many of our international boys building their English skills through drama. Some particularly humorous moments came from Miguel playing an incompetent fisherman and Juan as a catwalk model! The boys enjoyed devising short mime scenes, using movement creatively to portray a variety of characters and worked on creating dialogues using props and costume as a stimulus. Performing these scenes in front of their peers allowed them to develop their confidence in acting for an audience and they delighted in giving feedback to their fellow performers. Many of the scenes showcased the great talent and creativity of our pupils, including Henry as a convincing dragon slayer, Arjun as a disgruntled customer with a terrific accent, and Sam M and Sam O in a nuanced interaction between very important businessmen!

In the Summer Term, we welcomed Miss Ellen Shand to School to deliver two days of workshops. Ellen is a freelance drama tutor and actress who has worked with the Strange Town Theatre Company in Edinburgh for several years, and works with youth drama groups throughout Scotland. In May, Ellen joined us to run a ‘Play in a Day’ Workshop with our J4 and J5 pupils. The junior boys used ideas from their History and English lessons to create their very own characters and story from scratch, which they then performed for parents at the end of the day. Oskar, Omar,