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  • Drama lessons

    I enjoyed Drama lessons quite a bit - it was a chance to express oneself and be what one wanted to be; a sort of Let's Pretend for 11 to 16 year olds. So much so that I even attended a Saturday morning workshop at another school for three years and took GCSE Drama for my options in Year 10 and 11 - I quite liked the fact that when I started Comprehensive School, Drama was the last lesson of the week on Friday afternoons - which was a way of unwinding almost in time for the weekend.

    There are a couple of points that I would like to make - in most schools it seemed to be the case that the Drama teacher also taught English, probably because of the connection with literature, Shakespeare, and plays and all that. Also, if the Drama teacher didn't teach English, then they almost seemed to be young female teachers who are mostly new to teaching, and are almost like those who teach French, only with an English accent - I made these points when I started the Teacher Stereotypes thread over a year ago. For some reason, the Drama teacher said that we needed trainers to wear for the Drama lessons - ironic considering that trainers were not allowed in school except for PE.

    The Drama Room had dark coloured walls, blackout blinds, and sets of sub-disco lights attached to the ceiling via metal bars so one had this keyboard thing to dim or brighten the lights if needed. Some kids risked life and limb swinging on the bars, risking the apparatus falling down and almost killing everyone in the room, which the teacher obviously reminded them when someone did just that. Literally, it was drama in more ways than one - indeed, some see it as a cue for messing about.

    At the start of Year 7 (as it would have been known as), we didn't do Drama work as such, just the equivalent of warm-up exercises (fruit bowl, anyone?), and observational things such who as whodunnits - who indeed was the Colonel Mustard of the Cluedo "murder"? Who removed the object and how can one tell it was that person - did anyone do that? Something called "Master of the Keys" came to mind. And a few weeks in, we did some "acting", or should I say "pretending" - things such as "I am a postman as I am delivering letters through this letterbox" sort of thing. It wasn't until Year 9 that what I would call Drama took its course, and when I mean that, it was drama by virtue of some of the group didn't behave as they should do.

    On many occasions we sat in a circle with books that had written plays inside them, and some of us had to choose a part and follow it as it goes along - I believe that most actors train in this sort of way. My nephew had done some professional acting in TV dramas and films when he was younger, and has worked with famous people which I will not namedrop on here, and so GCSE Drama would have been such a huge boost towards his career - I never make reference to him as I think it would be unfair. I was even an extra in a BBC Screen Two drama back in 1991 which meant a Tuesday (4th June 1991) afternoon off school, (which I wouldn't have said no to at all), although we were just part of a background scene and so it doesn't really count - one or two others got a bit more prominence, I believed at the time.

    And of course, we did that classic stalwart of Drama lessons, playing charades aka Give us a Clue - now, did anyone else do that in their Drama lessons? We obviously had male v female teams as tradition permits; I was not the Lionel Blair of my own team, and neither did I sit in the player's seat in order to keep it warm when he was standing up to perform either. One of the answers was "Murder, She Wrote" or something - cue Yours Truly pretending to faint or fall on the floor as if something bad had happened - but the thing was, something bad didn't happen as the team got it within one minute! Of course, being kids, this was an ideal opportunity to do rude gestures with one's hands, almost as Lionel himself would have done so to fellow teammates Bernie Winters, Lennie Bennett and Leslie Crowther back in the 1980s.

    We didn't really get to do theatre trips such as see Opera North at the Nottingham Theatre Royal as result of our lessons, thank goodness, but in recent years, Drama has enriched my interest in travelling around the country and seeing musicals at the theatres around Great Britain as I mentioned in that other thread. I saw the odd children's play there at Junior School but didn't really do that in those Year 7 to 11 days.

    Drama was one of the few lessons I liked as well as English Language (not Literature, mind) and PSE as I thought it would give me a pathway to a future career - well, it almost did in a way. It did get me into my interest in theatres and reading the odd copy of The Stage many years later. I think that the nature of the Arts and in particularly Drama is such a precious one as it can breed future Britain's Got Talent stars, soap operas and goodness-knows who else will become famous in the near future.

    Did anyone do Drama lessons in school? Did you enjoy them, and did you even do the "Give us a Clue" and the whodunnits, or was it just warm-up exercises, having lines in plays or just acting?
    I've everything I need to keep me satisfied
    There's nothing you can do to make me change my mind
    I'm having so much fun
    My lucky number's one
    Ah! Oh! Ah! Oh!

  • #2
    Re: Drama lessons

    I refused to do any acting ( Aspergers) but luckily our drama teacher put me on the sound and lighting ... master stroke


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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    • #3
      Re: Drama lessons

      I was never good at learning lines but liked putting on a play.

      The warm up games were always stupid, especially if we were in the middle of putting a play together with friends & wanted to rehearse.
      The Trickster On The Roof

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      • #4
        Re: Drama lessons

        I used tolove Drama and I can understand it's connections with English Lessons and Shaskesphere/Wprdsworth etc and even Robbie Burns as far as that goes

        Myy main memories of it are in the First year (Year 70 and I think yeah she was a Blonde Haired Teacher and I know she came from Manchester and she was willing to let a select few of us write to here (as a Pen Type thing but Teacher-based) though I know it'd not be allowed these days - such contact - though of course the School Office would have sent it and scrutonized it etc I am certain

        Again though-like with the Foreign Visitors story I regalled on here, with the address been nicked off me by a BGully - it was the sme with the Drama Teacher - aving it in the "palm of my hand" (not literally) but being selected .... then de-selected somehow!!

        On a sub-note did anyone else find Drama was linked too to Music and Art as well as English??? ....... as was so both way's in my 2 Schools!!

        80sChav

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        • #5
          Re: Drama lessons

          Due to the vagaries of the timetable, I was forced to choose between Gardening, Drama, RE and something else as part of GCE....perm any 2 out of 4. I chose RE (the teacher was super hot) and Drama (I hated Gardening and the other subject).


          It's been 40+ years, so I can't recall it that well now, but I think our Drama teacher only taught that subject. We had the lesson on a Monday morning and he would bring in a portable cassette player and play Monday, Monday by The Mamas and the Papas. We had to attend several professional plays as part of the course, one of which was called Enter Sherlock Holmes at the Derby Playhouse--probably Autumn 1976. Our school would put on a play every year around December. It was invariably a musical, and Drama pupils were expected to take part. For some reason, the expected musical was ditched and we put on Arthur Miller's The Crucible, a rather grim tale of witch-hunting in 17th century Salem, and based on true events. I can remember that the girls doing GCE Needlework made our costumes, and they had to take our measurements--I was called out of class by two girls who took me into an empty room and who then took my measurements, much to the envy of other boys in the class. I was never really that keen on Drama. It was one of the least two worst out of four subjects I didn't like. Consequently, when it came to the final exams, I gave it a low priority for revision, preferring to concentrate on Maths, Physics, History, Technical Drawing etc.

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          • #6
            Re: Drama lessons

            Originally posted by Zincubus View Post
            I refused to do any acting ( Aspergers) but luckily our drama teacher put me on the sound and lighting ... master stroke
            I think that the downside to acting is trying to learn lines, being in character - i.e. responding to someone else's name as if it's your own, and things like that. Although I do like to express myself, I don't think that I would stomach doing a live performance on stage in fear of "drying up" and having a "prompter" feeding the lines to me - on the other hand, the irony there is the risk of doing a "Tommy Cooper" and almost being a failure could help me be more of a success, as long as the audience laughs with me and not at me.

            As I said before, I watch musicals at theatres around the country (see that thread for more details), and I have to admit that I almost feel as nervous entering the theatre itself as the actors would be who would be just moments from performing - it is nice to feel nervous on the cast's behalf as one obvious knows what they have to do in such a short space of time, and it shows one's support for them - they sometimes up to two performances a day, and at least one six days a week with the seventh day travelling from one venue to the next. It may have been their 75th time that they have performed the play or musical but the chances are it is to a different audience almost every time. When I read the copy of the programme and see the profiles of the actors, the first thing that comes into my mind is something like "she must have came top in Drama when she was at school", and I am probably correct with that assumption.

            Did anyone play Mary or Joseph in the Nativity play, or were you an Angel (just like Melissa George was in Home and Away)?
            I've everything I need to keep me satisfied
            There's nothing you can do to make me change my mind
            I'm having so much fun
            My lucky number's one
            Ah! Oh! Ah! Oh!

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: Drama lessons

              Also, it made me think of those Grange Hill episodes where they did their own productions - the Joseph and his Technicolour Dreamcoat one from series 2 (1979); the Revue from series 5 (1982) which I keep thinking was the final episode of that series (it was episode 16 which was the same number of episodes that series 3 had in 1980), and it was also memorable for Precious Matthews wearing Brutus Jeans more suited to 1976. And of course the Mods and Rockers one from series 8 (1985). Of course they could easily perform such a thing in the series as they have the real-life irony of being actors from the start! The actors were playing characters who were in turn playing characters!
              I've everything I need to keep me satisfied
              There's nothing you can do to make me change my mind
              I'm having so much fun
              My lucky number's one
              Ah! Oh! Ah! Oh!

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: Drama lessons

                My secondary school had a play each year, even though I liked Drama I never took part in any, as I was already struggling with homework & didn't have any spare time.

                My sister took part in 2 as extras, she was hoping to get a good part in her last year, but a teacher she didn't like was running it, & was only letting her cliquey drama club get the lead roles, so she didn't bother.
                The Trickster On The Roof

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                • #9
                  Re: Drama lessons

                  Originally posted by zincubus View Post
                  i refused to do any acting ( aspergers) but luckily our drama teacher put me on the sound and lighting ... Master stroke


                  sent from my iphone using tapatalk pro
                  Same here. I made myself as small and inconsequential as possible, and if necessary pretended to be ill if I was in any drama production, which were rare at the schools I attended.

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                  • #10
                    Re: Drama lessons

                    Originally posted by Pussywillow View Post
                    Same here. I made myself as small and inconsequential as possible, and if necessary pretended to be ill if I was in any drama production, which were rare at the schools I attended.
                    Two of us then ... all the others seemed to love it !


                    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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