Innehållsförteckning för September 2024 från Ink Pellet

With around 220 students, BOVTS is very small by higher education standards. “Yes, it’s very much a community and because of our size everyone knows everyone else, and the students benefit from a lot of individual attention, mentoring and personalised teaching”, says Ali de Souza. “And somehow that means that the emphasis is on kindness and decency. We train our students on all our courses to understand that you must behave pleasantly, or you won’t get offered another job. I have come to believe that everyone should do one year of drama school training because, done well, it develops so many life and communication skills.” And I sense that he’s only half joking. Ali adds: “And because we’re tiny there is lots of scope for collaboration between courses and students…

NATIONAL DRAMA Primary Conference – Why Drama? The Impact of Drama within the Primary Curriculum Friday 27th September, Alma Lodge Hotel, Stockport SK2 6EL www.nationaldrama.org.uk/events/ REGIONAL SEND WORKSHOP Join us for a workshop on drama in specialist education, happening on October 4th. All teachers and practitioners welcome. October 4th, Elmsbank College Hub, Prestwich, Manchester, M25 1JH SHAKESPEARES GLOBE The Taming of the Shrew 6 June – 26 October #TheTamingoftheShrewGlobe The Comedy of Errors 21 August – 27 October #TheComedyOfErrorsGlobe Princess Essex 13 September – 26 October #PrincessEssexGlobe Tickets £5-£75 www.shakespearesglobe.com WICKED ACTIVE LEARNING Wicked Active Learning, the acclaimed cultural and social education programme for London’s award-winning stage musical at the Apollo Victoria Theatre champions learning outside the classroom, personal development, and curriculum enrichment. Free, downloadable teacher resource packs and lesson…

“A concert hall is like a high street” says Adam. “You have 365 units to sell – that is nights in the year. And you have to get customers, concert goers, in through all those doors just as if they were shops.” Cadogan Hall, which has 950 seats, is a Grade 2 listed building, formerly a Christian Scientist church just off Sloane Square in Chelsea. Having fallen into disrepair in the mid 1990s it was bought by Mohammed El Fayed, who was refused planning permission to develop it into a mansion. Property company Cadogan Estates purchased it in 2000, extensively refurbished and it opened as a concert hall in 2004. In June, this year Cadogan Hall celebrated its 20th birthday. “We launched the Zurich International Orchestra Series in 2005, which…

A new exhibition at the British Museum is set to showcase around 100 prints from one of the world’s best-known artists – Pablo Picasso (1881‒1973) – including some never displayed pieces from his acclaimed 347 Suite. Though most famous for his paintings, Picasso made prints throughout his career, often in periods of intense activity, producing around 2,400 in total. The British Museum’s collection of the artist’s prints has grown significantly in recent years and is now the largest collection in the United Kingdom, numbering over 500. The autobiographical nature of Picasso’s work means his prints offer unique insights into his life and loves, as well as his creativity and extraordinary artistic vision. The exhibition will chart the artist’s long-standing, if at times episodic, engagement with printmaking from his formative period…

Kiss Me Kate – Barbican Theatre, London There’s much to enjoy in this production (director: Bartlett Sher) of Cole Porter’s 1948 classic in which a theatre company in Baltimore is rehearsing The Taming of the Shrew – with parallels between the cast and the roles they’re playing. But it isn’t flawless. Adrian Dunbar, as the company director Fred Graham also playing Petruchio, is a fine actor with a gift for timing funny lines perfectly. His singing, however, is adequate (there has clearly been a lot of work with a singing teacher) rather than great and his American accent slips away quite rapidly. Stephanie J Block, however, is top-notch as the prima-donnaish Lilli Vanessi trying to work round the issues of playing Katherine against her ex-husband for whom feelings are rekindling…

Once or twice in recent months corners of the press have muttered about the teaching of handwriting. Should we continue to devote spend so much energy to it, given that most writing is now typed in every field of life? Well, I think handwriting is still an essential life skill for many reasons. First, the formation of letters and attention to them is integral to the development of literacy and, crucially, reading. If we were to stop teaching that and simply give four-year-olds a keyboard they would, I suspect find the whole literacy process more difficult. Second, the rhythm of writing is how most of us learn to spell. How many times have you needed to remind yourself how a word is spelled – and done so by writing it…

Where do you come from? I’m a loyal south Londoner like you! I was born in Crystal Palace and have lived variously in Forest Hill, Penge, Beckenham, Upper Norwood and now Bromley. I trained on the acting course at Rose Bruford College (still in South London!) and especially liked the physical theatre tutorials that were part of it. I also did a writing course while I was there and got bitten by the bug. I graduated in 1996. How easily did you find work? There was a Persil advert in 1998 which, amazingly ran for 14 years and because it was a traditional agreement I got a royalty every time it aired: very useful! I had minor roles in shows like Casualty and I did a season with the RSC in…