michaelbeigel:

Tuesday just gone at Chester Blue Coat School we had the first workshop of this term of Quartz - Theatre in the Quarter’s Youth Theatre group for ages 14-20. We were very excited to be welcoming two practitioners from Liverpool based theatre company Tmesis to lead a workshop on physical storytelling.

It was great to gain some different insights on methods of creation and performance and the young actors engaged well and created some really entertaining improvisations. The show we will be creating this term has big demands in terms of storytelling and we will certainly be embracing aspects of this work as we go into rehearsals.

Another delight was how many young actors we had in attendence, we were hoping to have a similar number to last term, around the 18 mark maybe plus a couple more. In fact 31 walked through our doors: some returning from last term, some who have attended Quartz in the past, some who took part in the summer project For the Fallen and some who have made the step up in age group from Jigsaw. It was great to see so many new and returning faces and the standard of work last week alone has set a high bench mark.

It has sent me in to a bit of an excited frenzy, as I am also writing the show this term, I have been happily drafting and redrafting and rethinking how the storytelling can best suit this bumper crop of acting talent. I’m excited about the staging and increased scale we can now achieve and I can’t wait to hear them singing together. I know that together we have the opportunity to create a really delightful show and cannot wait for tonight when we get to embark on this journey proper!