Bloxham School’s main dramatic production of the school year takes place this week in its traditional place in the calendar, but this was not always the case. Up to the 1960s, the major production tended to take place on Founderstide in the open air and then the Great Hall after it opened in 1937, and usually consisted of an abridged Shakespeare play or a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta. In the sixties, a wider range of dramatic opportunities were explored, with 1963’s Julius Caesar, directed by Richard Theobald and John Gardiner, an especially memorable production. From the late sixties onwards a golden generation of Bloxham actors, among whom Patrick Ryecart (Cr 65-70) and Pip Torrens (Ry 73-77) went on to great things in theatre and television, coincided with a talented group of members of staff to create a series of notable and increasingly ambitious school plays, which were now fixed in their current position towards the end of the Michaelmas Term. Three productions from consecutive years which stand out from the era of Director of Drama, Brian Joplin, are Brendan Behan’s The Hostage (1986), whose huge cast included soldiers descending by rope from the ceiling of the Great Hall, Middleton and Rowley’s The Changeling (1985) and Congreve’s The Way of the World (1987) – an impressive indication of the sheer variety of Brian’s repertoire.
1. JULIUS CAESAR 1963 (John Gardiner and Richard Theobald) – Gareth Williams (Eg 61-64) as Caesar
2. THE MASTERS 1975 (Brian Joplin and Rob Worrall) – Pip Torrens (Ry 73-77) second from left
Brian Joplin’s successor, Charles Atkinson, was especially adept at choosing productions which gave opportunities to a wide spectrum of acting abilities, from those who would go on to a career in drama, such as Nick Atkinson (Sy 92-97) and Matthew Gregory (Sy 86-91), to those for whom this was their first taste of a large-scale production. Goethe’s Faust Part One (1996) was the epitome of this approach, but others in the same vein were Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus (2007) and Calamity Jane (1990), unusual at the time for being a musical. The title role in the latter was taken by Theresa Colville-Wright (Colville, PC Cr 89-91), one of the increasing number of girls in the School, which had a liberating effect on producers and casts alike, especially after the School went fully co-ed in 1998. Other outstanding performances from this era included Emily Orley (in Andrew Whiffin’s production of Antony and Cleopatra (1994) and Louise Christopher (SH Wf 90-92) in Amadeus (1991), directed by Anthony Benn.
3. AMADEUS 1991 (Anthony Benn) – Connor Kelly (Cr 88-93), Louise Christopher (SH Wf 90-92)
4. ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA 1994 (Andrew Whiffin) – Dan Clutterbuck (Eg 92-97) , Freddie Rosso-Baldacchino (SH Sy 93-95), Emily Orley, Sara Leport (SH Eg 94-96)
The last decade has seen a reduction in the number of traditional plays and an increasing proportion of devised drama and reimagining of traditional stories, of which this year’s Robin Hood: The Legend. Re-written is a prime example. Two of the highlights of recent years were Sam Brassington’s powerful 79 (2014), which told the stories of those Bloxhamists who went off to war a century before, and Joe Hornsby’s 2022 ‘in the round’ production of Cyrano de Bergerac, with Bertie Bond (LS Sy 16-23) outstanding in the title role.
No dramatic production can succeed without a team of set builders and stagehands, and Bloxham has been lucky over the years to be able to call on the likes of Ed Wilkowski and Martin Pye in this regard, while a veritable army of makeup and costume technicians, led for many years by the wonderful Griselda Parrington, have been of equal importance. There can be few, if any, schools in the country which are able to call upon the expertise and resourcefulness shown by Sally Brittin-Snell, our Wardrobe Manager for the last twenty years, whose RSC background and contacts in the industry enable her to make the very most of the budget allocated.
5. DR FAUSTUS 2007 (Charles Atkinson) – Rado Lolov (Cr 06-08)
6. COPACABANA 2008 (Rob Hastings and Dan Jordan) – Josh Herring (Eg 06-10), Rebecca Young (LS Wf 02-09)
7. CORAM BOY 2018 (Sam Brassington and Fiona Mikel) – Arthur Kemp (Wn 15-20), Goergie Lagden , Robert Frankland (Cr 16-21)
