Drama

Drama is a thriving department at St Mary’s Catholic School. We have superb facilities, with two large teaching spaces; a black box studio and a traditional school hall as well as dressing rooms and a well-stocked costume store. The standard of performance is exceptionally high with students winning local and national competitions.

We frequently work with the National Theatre, with Rufus Norris, the ‘New Views’ playwriting competition or the Connections festival. We also have close ties with the National Youth Theatre as our Subject Leader, Miss Gill, is an Education Representative. We have an enviably high success rate of getting students into the NYT. Our theatre trips are to plays as diverse as “Everyman”, “Carousel” and “Bouncers” to introduce students to a wide range of styles and genres. Our school productions are always big family-friendly shows, with a dynamic mix of Shakespeare, classic musicals and new writing and performers and backstage crew from all year groups.

Recent productions include “Henry V”, “Guys and Dolls”, “As You like It” and “A Christmas Carol”. Our students go on to study at prestigious universities such as Cambridge and Warwick or train at highly competitive institutions such as Laine Theatre Arts and Italia Conti.

"The Sound of Music" will be performed on Wednesday 6th, Thursday 7th and Friday 8th December, 2017 at 7pm in the school hall. Tickets are available from the finance office.

Year 7 Units

Serious Fun
It was Terrifying
Greek Theatre
Evacuation
Introduction to Script Work
“Ernie’s Incredible Illucinations”

Year 8 Units

Melodrama
Physical Theatre
Commedia dell’arte
Stereotype and Beyond
Medieval Theatre
“A Feeling in my Bones”

Year 9

Status
Evaluating live theatre
Introduction to technical theatre
“Living with Lady Macbeth”

GCSE Drama

We follow the Eduqas GCSE Drama specification, which is a highly intellectually demanding, time-consuming as well as engaging course. Students opting for Drama must be able to attend rehearsals on Mondays after school, work co-operatively in a team and listen to feedback. Students must manage their time well to balance the practical requirements such learning lines, finding costumes and attending lunchtime rehearsals with writing coursework, going to the theatre and studying a set text for the written exam. All students taking GCSE Drama must perform in the school production or work backstage, in addition to their exam performances and most GCSE Drama students are also members of a local youth theatre.

During the course, students attend exciting theatre trips and write evaluations of design and technical aspects of the productions as well as acting. Students must be confident actors or designers, have excellent attendance and co-operate well with others in order to succeed in the course. Students studying the GCSE Drama course often comment that it is their most difficult and demanding GCSE option, but also the most rewarding.

Component 1: Devised Performance & Written Portfolio. (40%)

Students are placed in a small group by their teacher. (Friends are separated)
Students create and perform a piece to an audience of parents and teachers.
The piece is in response to a stimulus and influenced by a practitioner.
Students write a portfolio of supporting evidence.

Component 2: Scripted Performance (20%)

Students are placed in a small group by their teacher. (Friends are separated).
Students rehearse and perform an extract from a script.

Component 3: Written Exam (40%)

Study of set text, e.g. ‘DNA’ by Dennis Kelly
Evaluation of a live theatre performance seen.

A-level Theatre Studies
This is a challenging mixture of practical and academic study. Students opting for Theatre Studies are highly driven and conscientious with 70% achieving A/A* grades in 2016. Students work collaboratively to create highly polished devised and scripted work, taking responsibility for all aspects of their production from mending costumes, painting sets, to cleaning the props cupboard. Attendance at rehearsals after school and during holidays is compulsory and expectations are very high, with a track record of students achieving full marks in performance, four years running!

Students attend the theatre regularly in their own time, being influenced by seeing work in London, Cambridge and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Students create innovative and highly physical ensemble work, requiring a good level of fitness for example “Jane Eyre” in the style of Shared Experience, a slapstick comedy “Three Men in a Boat”, a verbatim play “London Road” or an immersive experience inspired by Punchdrunk. There is no ‘house style’ at St Mary’s and students are encouraged to pursue their own interests through extensive research and develop their talents through intensive practice.

In recent years students have taught themselves to tap dance, play the guitar or speak in a Yorkshire accent. The rigour and varied demands of the course mean students not only gain public speaking but also leadership skills. The maturity and resilience they develop mean that they are often chosen to be the Head Pupils. Theoretical study is demanding at A-level and the standard of their written essays is equally high, with the exam board requesting St Mary’s work to be used as exemplar material.

Students follow the Eduqas A-level course, studying set texts such as “As You Like It” and “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time” for a final written exam, worth 40%. The remaining 60% is made up of practical performance work and written coursework. This is a highly rigorous course which demands a broad range of skills and considerable time commitment.