On Monday 2 March, the Upper 4 drama club participated in the Welwyn Garden City Youth Drama Festival, which was hosted at the Barn Theatre. This is an annual, week-long festival, where schools in both the junior and senior categories, compete for various awards. The best performances are awarded prizes at the end of the week.
Sophie in Upper 4 writes about their experience. We were directed by two Upper 6 students- Millie and Shreya – and we decided to perform a shortened version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare. We started to rehearse a few weeks before February half-term, every Tuesday lunch time, during Upper 4 drama club. We had very creative and interpretive costumes and makeup, and we found everything in our very own costume cupboard!
Before we knew it, the night of the performance had arrived; we were the first to perform that evening, which meant we opened the whole festival. This was a lot of pressure, but it made us even more excited and determined to do the best we could, and almost as soon as it had started, it was over, and the Adjudicator was about to critique our performance! He gave us many positive remarks, as well as some useful improvements that we all took on board for the future.
Overall, it was an exciting and beneficial experience which everyone worked really hard on, and although we were all quite nervous before performing, it felt like such an incredible achievement when we had finished. Despite the fact that it was a small theatre, we all really enjoyed practising our public speaking and performance skills, and would highly recommend the experience. It was such a confidence booster and an exhilarating experience.
