Congratulations to the overall winners of last night’s House Drama competition, Wilberforce House!
The theme for this year’s competition was Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
All of the performances were directed and acted by groups of students from each Boarding House and the ingenious ways in which they adapted the stories to suit theatre, with no props or costumes allowed, produced original plays that gave the audience plenty of opportunities for a laugh. As well as originality and acting ability, judging also took into account the length of time the play took, and any misuse of props and costumes leaving the judges faced with difficult decisions after admiring the talent that was spread across the houses.
The evening opened with a really fantastic adaptation of Rumpelstiltskin from Seymour, setting the bar high for the remaining ensembles. Fairy tales that followed were Raymond’s Cinderella, Wilberforce’s Little Red Riding Hood, Egerton’s Rapunzel, Crake’s Snow White and Wilson’s Hansel and Gretl. The runners up prize went to Wilson; with their funny and creative dialogue and clever use of space. Winners of the ensemble piece were Wilberforce, with their polished performance of Little Red Riding Hood. The use of rhyme and synchronised speeches in the script was polished to perfection, creating a really effective and strong piece.
The competition also includes a monologue round, with each house nominating a member to give a monologue, no mean feat under the lights, in front of all your peers. The first monologue was Ben K’s heartfelt performance of The Frog Prince, followed by Third Former Robert F, with an excerpt from the film Jaws. The monologues are normally performed by Sixth Formers and it was great to see a Third Former pull off such a brilliant performance. Ali F-R then went on to give a hilarious adapted Rowan Atkinson scene “Drunk English in Indian Restaurant” with witty stereotypes and plenty of clever jokes. Cecily B of Raymond pulled off the difficult “Audition” by Jane Martin with exceptional flair and great use of space. The runners up prize in the monologue section went to Wilberforce’s Georgie P who performed The Sugar Syndrome by Lucy Prebble. The winner of the monologue prize went to Sam D from Seymour with his incredible excerpt from the Addams Family, complete with convincing goats and crows!
The evening drew to a close with a lovely performance of The Elves and The Shoemaker from fourteen Exham students.
A huge congratulations to all of the Bloxham students, for pulling together as a team and producing such outstanding pieces. Photos from the night can be found here.