SVS 'The Wardrobe' Programme - June 2022

Sutton Valence School presents

THE

WARDROBE

by Sam Holcroft

27th, 28th and 29th JUNE 2022

THE WARDROBE

F

or our Junior production of The Wardrobe

by Sam Holcroft, pupils from the First, Second and Third Forms inventively take us back in time through the medium of an elaborately carved wardrobe.

We first encounter the wardrobe in 1485 at the English royal court. The Battle of Bosworth has been lost, and Elizabeth of York hides from her future husband, King Henry VII. Consoled by her sister, she rails at the injustice of being barred from inheriting the crown, simply because she is a woman.

The play unfolds through a series of intimate duologues which trace the passing centuries and the changes it brings. The students explore challenging topics from anti-Semitism to the abolition of the slave trade.

Cast Scene 1485 Elizabeth of York Cecily of York

Dulcie Cole Sophia Parkin

Scene 1633 Daniel Santa Maria Abigail Santa Maria

Chester Livesey Sophie Petrie

Scene 1644 Henry Archer Ripley Mathilda Evelyn Westlake Tobias Harry Heyworth Caryl Constance Patmore

Scene 1827 Martine Amber Wilson Roberta Matilda Foreman Scene 1888 Tom Oscar Anderson Hugo Joshua Slaughter James Peter Trott Archie James Charlesworth Scene 1916 Anthony Lydia Alexander Nell Charlotte Taylor

Scene 1665 Anne Lydia Alexander Mary Darcy Bird Sarah Simone Rai

Scene 1962 Nancy Isabel Gowing Wendy Lily Walsh Jacqueline Lydia Head

Scene 1704 Eliza Williams Jane Williams

Scene 2022 Harriet Seren Lloyd-Jones Bella Grace Manning-Greene

Charlotte Slaughter Lily Walsh

Scene 1805 William Thomas Greene Jeffery Kit Hodson

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SCENE 1485 cecily of york - Sophia Parkin, Second Form In the first scene, Elizabeth of York is set to be married to Henry VII. Eager to tell her sister about this, she finds her in the wardrobe and they sit down to discuss the upcoming marriage. Cecily is more outgoing and a little louder than her sister, this is shown by her casual use of the dagger and attitude towards her sister.

During this scene, Cecily discusses feeling like she is living in her older sister’s shadow.

When Elizabeth points out that Cecily would marry him if he died, she begins to consider playing the “Game of death” her sister described to get the power that she desires after a life knowing that it will not be hers.

Playing Cecily has and will be a great experience, especially since for many of us, this is our first real play since Covid. I am looking forward to the first performance!

elizabeth of york - Dulcie Cole, Second Form In this production of The Wardrobe, Sophia and I are in the first scene as Elizabeth of York and her sister, Cecily. In the scene we explain how I (Elizabeth of York) am being forced into marriage. I explain that if I die, my husband was to marry Sophia (Cecily) which leads to Sophia then attempting to murder me.

I think this scene has taught both me and Sophia a number of things, such as, how to understand how a person is feeling, the history behind the early Tudors and, most importantly, how to work on stage with other actors/actresses. I have enjoyed playing Elizabeth of York very much, and I think she has taught me a lot, and I’m sure I can say the same for Sophia and her character.

SCENE 1633 ABIGAIL santa maria - Sophie Petrie, First Form Being in the play as Abigail and Daniel was an amazing experience that we thoroughly enjoyed. We got to use our imaginations and improvise some of it which was creative and fun. It was filled with humour and our favourite part was eating the banana. It was hilarious but also educational because as well as having fun, we learnt some Hebrew too and about what religion was like for everyone back in 1633.

Daniel santa maria - Chester Livesey, First Form It was a great experience to broaden my interests and meet new people. I may not be a banana lover but you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.The play should be an amazing watch. After our long hard working weeks of learning lines, preparing transitions and performing to our limits. We are ready.

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SCENE 1644 TOBIAS - Harry Heyworth, First Form MAThILDA - Evelyn Westlake, First Form HENRY - Archer Ripley, First Form CARYL - Constance Patmore, First Form When the four of us auditioned for the Junior play, scene three caught our eyes and shone out to us. When the final casting came, we were all ecstatic to be in a scene together because we knew we could work productively with each other, without too much misbehaviour. With the bonus of having two Drama scholars, Evie Westlake and Archer Ripley, we had the advantage of different ideas to make the scene the greatest it could be.

Through some missed rehearsals, lost voices, and injures, all the cast can agree that our scenes and friendships have become stronger from every practice. From meeting Mrs Buckland and reading the script for the first time to now, the cast has gone through a range of different emotions. The final week of preparations has been intense and we look forward to bringing you the show!

On behalf of all the cast, we want to thank Mrs Buckland for the last six months of hard work she has put in to ensure that we are ready!

Harry Heyworth and Evelyn Westlake

SCENE 1665 sarah - Simone Rai, Third Form I enjoyed working on this play with some great actors, Darcey and Lydia who really suited their characters and, together, we managed to bring the script to life. It was a delight rehearsing this play and I think we all put in our best. The wardrobe’s presence really added to the whole experience.

mary - Darcey Bird, Second Form In the past, I have been in many other plays, but The Wardrobe is the first one I have taken part in since lockdown. During my time at Sutton Valence School, my confidence has grown greatly and I am proud to be one of the wonderful cast members of The Wardrobe.

anne - Lydia Alexander, Second Form This is my first show at SVS, and I think it would be understatement to say that it has been a wonderful experience to work alongside these actors.

Darcey and Simone have been such brilliant people to work with, and I sincerely hope I will be able to work with them again.

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SCENE 1704 ELIZA WILLIAMS - Charlotte Slaughter, First Form JANE WILLIAMS - Lilly Walsh, First Form There are two girls in America at a time when Native Americans are fighting back against the colonising Americans in 1704. In this scene, Charlotte is teaching her little sister, played by Lilly Walsh, self-defence.

Learning to perform this scene has been so much fun. We have taught ourselves self-defence, which has meant occasionally we finished rehearsals a little battered and bruised. The scene is quite physical which requires different dramatic skills than other dialogue heavy scenes.

We’d like to thank Mrs Buckland for giving us the support and encouragement to perform the scene and for bringing out all the little details.

Charlotte Slaughter

SCENE 1805 WILLIAM - Thomas Green, First Form In my opinion my scene is a very good scene as it shows you how bad the slave trade was back in the olden days. My scene proves how bad the slave trade was and what awful things they had to do. This scene shows how cruel people used to be to kids.

My scene also shows that you should be able to love who you want to but it used to be illegal to love some people and individuals did not have the rights we do today. It shows that you should be anything you want to do and do what is right to you.

This shows the rights people should have got back in the olden days and slaves should not have been a thing and unpaid is even worse for them. I think my scene shows everyone should have equal rights and poor people should be allowed to do what rich people do. People all have rights and feeling of where they want to work or who they want to love.

JEFFERY - Kit Hodson, First Form Playing this role has been fun and difficult as the character has to go through many different emotions. My acting skills have improved and I have broadened my knowledge of the slave trade. I thing we both have enjoyed our roles and can’t wait to perform it.

My character goes through many emotions such as anger, depression and sadness. The life of the character if very different as I am a rich boy who has to hide my emotions for someone I cant love. Life back then was very different to now so people can’t love who they wanted to.

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SCENE 1827 martine - Amber Wilson, First Form ROBERTA - Matilda Foreman, First Form Being in this play has been an amazing experience for us, we have both learnt so much and we feel like our acting skills have increased since the first day. We agree that so much has changed, including our friendships, which have become stronger throughout the time spent with the cast.

Our scene has also opened our eyes into another world, the world of child labourers, where we are anything but ourselves. We have all tried so hard in this play and we know that nobody has regretted joining Drama.

SCENE 1888 TOM - Oscar Anderson, Third Form JAMES - Peter Trott, Second Form HUGO - Joshua Slaughter, Third Form ARCHIE - James Charlesworth, Third Form In our scene, there are four boys that have just come back from choir.

Tom (played by Oscar Anderson) reads the daily newspaper which is talking about a young lady who has been viciously murdered. The boys take the mick out of James (played by Peter Trott) who is really interested in what happens after the girl was killed. Suddenly, the wardrobes door starts to turn and they think that it is the murderer coming for them, slowly the back out of the wardrobe, leaving Tom all alone singing Sweet Violets.

We would all like to thank Mrs Buckland for putting so much effort into making this production happen and hope that next year’s one is just as good.

SCENE 1916 NELL - Charlotte Taylor, Second Form This is my first play at Sutton Valence School and by far my favourite play I have had the chance to take part in. I used to find it quite hard to speak in front of others, but since being at SVS, and in this play, I have become more confident in myself. My character is Anthony’s fiancé. Anthony is going to war and Nell is extremely worried that he won’t come back. Having the chance to put myself in the shoes of somebody from the First World War’s shoes is an honour and I’m very thankful that been given the chance to take part in this production.

ANTHONY - Lydia Alexander, Second Form I have been in two scenes in this show.This is the second, and I can honestly say that this is such a great scene to act because of the history around it. I have really enjoyed playing Anthony along with Charlotte playing Nell.

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SCENE 1962 nancy - Isabel Gowing, First Form WENDY- Lilly Walsh, First Form JACQUELINE - Lydia Head, First Form In this scene, two sisters cheer up their sick recovering friend by re creating a scene from The Lion,The Witch and The Wardrobe.We have enjoyed rehearsing this scene although there have been some challenges: we have struggled with all the improvisation and memorising where the props are at the right time.

SCENE 2022 harriet - Seren Lloyd-Jones, Third Form It was a joy to work with the younger years and to improve my confidence when performing. I was overjoyed when I found out I would be working with the one and only Grace Manning-Greene. Being a Drama scholar, I knew I had to perform my very best for the audience. It was good to be able to work with other people, also from different years. The staging is very well put together and Grace and I both think Mrs Buckland put her all into this play and spent lots of time rehearsing with us.

BELLA - Grace Manning-Greene, Third Form For me, the play was a good introduction to acting. I was so happy to act alongside the amazing Drama scholar Seren Lloyd-Jones. The play has an interesting plot and I had never seen anything like it before. Acting in the play was unforgettable and I hope the audience enjoys the performance as much as we did when rehearsing.

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Production Team Director

Mrs K Buckland

Assistant Director

Megan Steele

Stage Manager

Mr B Fewson

Deputy Stage Manager

Jemima Wilson

Backstage Crew Lettice Alchorne Erin Macgregor Charlotte Pritchard Raphael Shaddick Iwen Victor-Obilahi Production Technician

Mr J Mitchell

Technicians Miss L Curran William Ervine

Costumes Larger Than Life Stagewear Oast Theatre Front of House Mr M Braddick Miss P Goodridge Miss L Gray Mrs E Head Mrs J Head Mrs C Kitchen Mr P Lee-Browne Miss J Manning Mrs B Palmer-Pilgrim Miss M Pitcher Mrs S Rose Miss C Young

Programme Design Mr W Radford

Makeup Artists Carlotta Chalk-Powell Jodie Russell Charlotte Wellings

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR’s notes Megan Steele, First Form

W

orking alongside Mrs Buckland in the Junior play was a memorable experience that I will definitely remember for a long time. For a girl like me who has a passion for acting it was really nice to be involved behind the scenes. Sadly I could not do the play my self due to my dancing and representing England in the Dance World Cup. My favourite part of being Assistant Director was helping my friends with their acting, but I also enjoyed the experience with the lights and learning how to operate them. I really do miss the enjoyment of being in a play but being Assistant Director was a really fun experience .Well done to everyone in the cast for working so hard and making this play come together nicely and especially to Mrs Buckland, without whom there would be no show.

I do hope that the audience really enjoy the show as much as I enjoyed working with the cast. I hope this will be a memorable experience for the cast, teachers and all of you - have a great show!

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Director’s Notes Mrs K Buckland

H

aving produced the last Junior production and three senior productions and having had my last attempt to direct a Junior Show disrupted by Covid lockdown, I was itching to direct my first show here at Sutton Valence. When I embarked on this journey, we had recently come out of the second lockdown and the future was by no means certain, I therefore wanted a play which was relatively “Covid proof”, so that any Covid related absence of members of the cast would not slow down the progress of the whole. “The Wardrobe” by Sam Holcroft with its self-contained scenes seemed the perfect solution to this, with the added benefit of giving every member of the cast a named character with a decent amount of stage time and dialogue – there are no ‘extras’ in this play!

“Across seven centuries, small groups of children seek sanctuary in the same solid old wardrobe. It’s the safest place they know, but is it safe enough?” Too often plays aimed at the younger age group can be superficial or ‘saccharin sweet’, but the subject matter in this play is as dark as it gets, exploring many difficult situations that children and young adults have had to face throughout the last 500 years, including forced marriage, war, death, abuse, and the changing attitudes to LBGTQ issues. All the scenes take places within the confines of a wardrobe, which lends a ‘pressure cooker-like’ atmosphere to the play. Yet, the play is not all ‘doom and gloom’ as the writer has managed to weave gentle humour with moments in history that ultimately depict the loss of innocence in these young people. My young cast have risen admirably to the challenges of presenting this play, approaching the scenes with maturity and intelligence. They have proven to be reliable and responsible in rehearsals which has made directing this play an absolute pleasure, and they have turned in some spectacular performances. I am immensely proud of all of them and I’m sure you will be too. I have also been pleasantly surprised by the backstage support willingly offered by older students of the school community. I hope that you will enjoy watching the play this evening as much as I have directing it, and I look forward to working with many of these young people again in the future.

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Sutton Valence School North Street Sutton Valence Maidstone Kent ME17 3HL