Past Outreach Workshops 2009

PurelyLovely
Michaelston Community College, Mary Immaculate RC School, Glyn Derw High School and Woodlands Special School - PurELY LovELY
April - July 2009

This was a really exciting project which both myself and Gaynor worked on. The concept was to create a "youth" Odyssey group by working with up to 6 students from each of the four schools, which included Woodlands Special School, meaning that this would be a mixed ability group of about 24.

PurelyLovely

We had 12 sessions and one weekend to put together a short devised show as part of the Ely Festival in July. The first sessions were dedicated to trying to get the young people working well together, with lots of emphasis on the students having to mix rather than always work with people they know.

PurelyLovely This proved very difficult to begin with, but as the weeks progressed and everyone got to know each other it became easier. By the end of the process the group had whittled down to a tight nit group of 15 who worked well together.

The group created a fantastic story to present to the audience about an imaginary island called Purely Lovely, in which Purely Lovely was saved from the evil slave master "Bob" by the Master Raver. The performance was enthusiastically received by an audience of about 100 friends and family at Michaelston Community College.

PurelyLovely We were also joined on the project by designer Terry Chin, whose fantastic dressing of the hall brought the whole fantasy to life and workshop assistants Matthew Cook and Mattew Purnell who assisted myself and Gaynor in leading the sessions.