Drama and Film Events, Summer 2011
The first half of the summer term sees a number of exciting drama and film events. Do consider joining us for one or more of these if you can. In most cases, tickets are available from Mrs Hart, the Arts Centre Secretary on 01235 849063, arts.sec@abingdon.org.uk or they can be ordered online (www.abingdon-booking.info).
We begin with a focus on the Abingdon Film Unit (AFU), one of the school’s extra-curricular strands that enables students aged 13 and above to make their own films under the guidance of a team of film industry professionals led by veteran documentarist, Michael Grigsby. AFU students have made well over a hundred films since the Unit began in 2003. Many of these have been screened at festivals throughout the UK and abroad.
The first date in this term’s AFU calendar is another London screening of One Foot on the Ground, the 30-minute documentary about Moldova made by sixth former Will Mcdowell and recent OAs Matthew Copson and Tom Bateman. Premiered at the National Film Theatre in March last year, and selected for the prestigious Raindance Festival last October, the film has again caught the attention of programmers, this time at the London International Doc Festival. The film will be shown on Monday May 16 at the Roxy Cinema in Southwark as part of a programme of shorts, starting at 18.30. See the Festival web site for tickets and further details.
Two days later, on Wednesday 18 May at 7.30pm, you are warmly invited to the 8th annual screening of new films. There is no charge for this event, but do please order your ticket(s) in advance from Mrs Hart to be sure of securing a seat. The event starts at 7.30pm and will finish by about 9.15 / 9.30pm. There is an interval, during which complimentary drinks will be offered. Those with anxieties about revision or early exams the next day are welcome to attend just part of the screening. This year we expect up to a dozen short films covering all manner of styles and genres, all worthy and interesting in different ways. For now, I'll recommend just two. At a little over nine minutes in length, The Art of Crime is the longest, most ambitious and arguably most successful AFU animation in the Unit's history. Produced by Michael Bicareggui, Chris Mears, Ollie Sayeed and Chris Young, it is a tour de force in clay. Chris Mears' original musical score is alone worth the price of admission...if you know what I mean. Inside is very different, but no less remarkable. It’s a 9-minute fiction film by James Yan that explores a very serious theme. Using professional actors, it tells a shocking and tense story of immense power. Those who have seen preview versions found it as compelling as any Hitchcock thriller.
As well as film, there is plenty of drama at Abingdon this term, including performances by some of Abingdon’s most recent arrivals, the members of Lower School. They present Roald Dahl's marvellous James and the Giant Peach, directed by fellow new kid on the drama block, Mr Ben Phillips. With three performances (Wednesday 25th May at 2pm and 7pm, and Thursday 26th May at 7pm), the Arts Centre is sure to rock to its foundations with a promenade performance that will take in the Abingdon School Drama Studio and the Amey Theatre.
Mr Phillips writes:
“Magic green pills spill, accidentally, onto the ground beneath a peach tree. A peach appears overnight, the only fruit the tree has ever produced; by morning, it's swollen to the size of a houseboat, and soon enough James Henry Trotter, escaping the clutches of his wicked aunts, is climbing aboard for the ride of his life. Our modern version features contemporary dance, song and physical theatre to re-tell Roald Dahl’s classic.”
After half term, two further productions take place. Abingdon’s fourth year actors appear in a production of Oscar Widle’s perennially popular comedy, The Importance of Being Ernest at St Helen’s, while a small senior cast of Abingdon pupils presents Samuel Beckett’s modern masterpiece Endgame in the Drama Studio. Details of those productions will follow later this term.
Jeremy Taylor, Director of Drama