this month's
Ink Pellet contains
A Final Haunt
After 33 extraordinary years, Susan Hill’s The Woman in Black will haunt the stage of the Fortune Theatre for the final time, as the production ends in the West End on Saturday 4th March 2023. PW Productions announce that after 33 extraordinary years in London’s West End, the theatrical sensation that is Susan Hill’s THE […]
Reaching for the Moon
Susan Elkin paid a visit to Half Moon theatre in London’s East End to chat with CEO Chris Elwell about their extensive education outreach and innovative theatre programmes. Half Moon Theatre sits in the heart of Limehouse in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, spitting distance from the DLR and mainline station. Formerly a pretty […]
National Youth Theatre Rep Company
The National Youth Theatre’s Rep Company is celebrating its first ten years and Susan Elkin paid a visit to learn more. Each year a group of fifteen or so talented NYT members, aged 18 to 25, are selected by audition to join this company. In just a few months they rehearse three shows, many of […]
Apprenticeships
An important and often overlooked route into the industry, especially for many non-performing roles. Susan Elkin has some suggestions. Theatre is like an iceberg. For every role on stage there are probably at least half a dozen technicians you can’t see. And the industry has been telling us for decades that there are skills shortages […]
School Shows
Never underestimate the power of a school production – for every single person involved. When you meet former students, sometimes from decades back in my case, it’s usually taking part in Oliver! or A Midsummer Night’s Dream that they reminisce about with shining eyes. Most importantly it’s a terrific bonding exercise. We hear a lot […]
New Perspectives
With three separate Lucian Freud exhibitions currently on, Graham Hooper took time to visit and here is his review of these contrasting shows. LLucian Freud would have been 100 this year, and that’s a good excuse to look back over his life and work, but especially his work, as the two have a rather nasty […]
Grandad Anansi – Half Moon Theatre
Predicated partly on Black History Month, Elayne Ogbeta’s muliti-layered play presents Grandad (Marcus Hercules) and his primary school age granddaughter, Abi (Jazmine Wilkinson) in his garden. Like everything else in this show, the garden designed by Sorcha Corcoran, is beautiful with lots of colour, light and plants that Grandad knows by name and talks to. […]
Theatre Review – The King of Nothing – Little Angel Theatre
Ben Glasstone’s charming, witty account of The Emperor Who Has No Clothes works well for two main reasons. First it is one of the most perceptive stories ever written, dealing as it does with vanity, self delusion, conformity and truth. It’s both topical and timeless. Second, we have a cost of living crisis and the […]
Book Review – Activist
by Louisa Reid Published by Guppy Books Cassandra, narrator of this powerful verse novel, is a reluctant sixth former in a prestigious mixed school, formerly all boys, where toxic culture simmers. Driven by her own experience, and by nature a feisty “shouter” she campaigns forcibly for acknowledgement that some of the boys at school treat […]
Book Review – A Poetry Pedagogy for Teachers: Reorienting Classroom Literacy Practice
by Maya Pindyck and Ruth Vinz, with Diana Liu and Ashlynn Wittchow The thrust of this detailed, well-researched, quite academic book about the poetry in classrooms is that we shouldn’t teach students to search for meaning so that “the poem becomes a specimen for examination under the microscope of interpretative practices”. Instead we should experience […]
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by Jenny McLachlan Published by Bloomsbury 2017 Meg is a self-confessed geek. She loves astronomy, is academically and scientifically very bright and knowledgeable. She wants to be an astronaut – and probably will be. She is also a teenager, mortified by the low level bullying she tolerates at school but imperceptibly developing feelings she doesn’t […]
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Jenny McLachlan is the author of a series of four books called Ladybirds. Her latest is a standalone. Stargazing for Beginners presents a girl passionate about astronomy and wanting to be an astronaut – as well as managing her life as a teenager with a problem or two. Susan Elkin spoke to her. How did […]
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by Robert Alan Evans Published by Samuel French Three short, experimental and heat-warming plays are tucked into this tome that could be used by both drama and English teachers, as well as youth theatre groups. Very different in content and tone, each one appeals to experiences that will be familiar to young audiences. Pondlife, created […]
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by Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff Published by Oneworld Publications This morning, Kady thought breaking up with Ezra was the hardest thing she’d have to do. This afternoon, her planet was invaded. The year is 2575, and two rival mega-corporations are at war over a planet that’s little more than an ice-covered speck at […]
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It’s an “issues play” about the experiences of young women across a number of cultures and situations. The intention is to get the audience talking, thinking – and perhaps seeking, or finding ways to help. Everyone gets a list of charities such as Amnesty International and LBTH Violence against Women and Girls at the end. […]
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This show, which is touring to schools, has developed from the RSC’s recent main house production of The Tempest. An abridged 90 minute version, it works perfectly. I found it clear, immersive and entertaining as did the Year 4 and Year 6 children I saw it with. Darren Raymond as a charismatic and authoritative Prospero […]
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We’re in a primary school head teacher’s office and Anna Reid’s set captures the atmosphere and detail beautifully. The play has a worthy stab at dealing with the dynamics, tension and issues too. Tests dominate the thinking because without certain results the school won’t get the all-vital pupil premium money to fund things such as […]
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Celebrating its fifth year, the recent Music & Drama Education Expo at Olympia proved to be an exciting, eclectic mix of workshops, seminars and exhibitors. Susan Elkin brings us a flavour of events You can hear the cavernous Olympia Central space rattling with trumpet blasts, people trying out pianos before you even get up the […]
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Michael McIntyre’s ‘Man Drawer’ sketch from his 2008 Hammersmith Apollo routine sums up my life with objects. The out-of-currency foreign coinage, the electrical leads with no obvious function, the keys to the house I no longer own and the batteries with dubious levels of charge – yes, I have that drawer. In fact my world […]
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Ezra LeBank – Associate Professor of Theatre Arts , CSULB Building on a panel from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education National Conference, I have continued research on concepts to utilize social media and digital technology to support teaching in studio theatre courses. One repeated request has been for a resource of ideas about […]