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Wednesday 11 December 2013
Can you help support Stage2's Mentor Scheme?
Wednesday 4 December 2013
Stage2’s Committees – Autumn Term 2013
This term has been an incredibly
exciting term for members of Stage2’s
Marketing and Fundraising committees.
Stage2’s Marketing Committee is always very interesting and
exciting, and provides its members with a wealth of
experience through helping to promote the company to the rest of the world!
The committee
meets twice a term, and this term focused on the Promotional Mix. This meant that members as young as 11 were
taking part in training on degree level marketing! As well as being provided with hand-outs and
talking about the theory side, we also got the chance to explore the concepts
through looking at popular television adverts and working in groups to come up
with an advertising plan for a hypothetical unlimited budget!
As well as the
training members have had the chance to complete a huge variety of tasks. Members have been involved in everything from
making an advertising display to writing press releases and researching
potential advertising avenues.
After a great
term, the whole committee is very excited to be able to put their newfound
training to work by spreading the word about the company and A
Chorus of Disapproval on the company’s distribution day on Saturday
21st December!
“Through the Marketing Committee I have learned so much about how I can
help Stage2 through marketing as
well as how I can market myself in interviews and things like that. Every term we learn something different and interesting.” – Jake
Hotchin, Marketing Committee Member
As usual, Stage2’s Fundraising Committee has also been hard at work looking
at how to raise money for the company, which is incredibly important for Stage2
to continue to be able to offer all the options it does. This committee is much
smaller than the Marketing Committee and is more ‘academically’ focused because
it involves tasks such as writing high standard applications and compiling
budgets. But don’t let that put you
off! The Fundraising Committee is a
fantastic way to get involved in Stage2
and gain invaluable work and life experience.
All members are fully supported through their time on the committee with
a number of tasks suitable for all levels of confidence.
This term has seen all the usual types
of tasks, which have varied from designing invitations to invite past, current
and potentially future funders to the LAMDA evening and production, all the way
up to starting our own complete fundraising projects.
As well as completing tasks, this
term the committee has received excellent and professional training in two
different sessions. The first session
included an overview of reading and understanding budgets which was really
useful for old and new members alike.
The second training session was held by Ellen Jurczack, an ex-member who
is now a professional fundraiser who started out in the Stage2 Fundraising Committee. This session was based on fundraising schemes
involving alumni and was incredibly interesting! Not only did we learn about how to run and
participate in one of these schemes we also learned how to improve basic skills
such as confidence and talking to strangers.
Because this training session was such a great opportunity, company
members outside of the committee were invited to come and experience it, an
offer which many members eagerly took up.
“This is my first term on the Fundraising Committee and I have learned
so much already! I put off joining the
committee because I wasn’t sure if I was suited to it, but have found
everything we have looked at this term really interesting and was offered help
with all my tasks, although in the end I didn’t even really need any!” – Wallis
Allen, Fundraising Committee Member
You don’t need any
experience to join the committee (most new members have none at all) as you
will be taught everything you need to know.
Both committees are available to join in the Spring term to anyone who
is interested and willing to commit!
“As a Stage2 member who is on
both of the Committees, I feel like I am really part of something
exciting. Every time I leave a committee
meeting I am incredibly excited to be part of such a fantastic company, telling
people all about Stage2 is only
difficult in that I could go on for hours!
I have been able to be part of a huge range of different tasks with Stage2 that have complimented my work
at University and made me feel both much more confident and much prouder!” – Andrew
Brown, Member of the Fundraising and Marketing Committees
HAVE YOU GOT YOUR SHARINGS TICKETS?
General Drama
This week in General Drama we decided to follow up this term's fantastic LAMDA Evening by having a session focussed on LAMDA, especially Stage2 LAMDA exams. After opening with a discussion about Tuesday's performances and what LAMDA is, we talked through the LAMDA file, with exercises inspired by different things- for example, to reflect contrast charts we tried to develop different performance styles, and for actioning the text we would do the same lines but with different intentions. This really familiarised our group with what it's like to do LAMDA, and we're hoping that a lot of them take an exam next term!
Technical Theatre
This week we ventured into the world of Costume Design. We started off by covering the basics of costume design and practicality before we branched off into smaller groups and began to create our own unique characters and costumes to fit. We had to be detailed on down to every element of the costume, the fabric and the colour. After presenting our ideas to each other we were challenged to recreate our costume designs using paper and cardboard. It was a mean feat indeed as we had a variety of character/costume designs ranging from time travelling beach goers to half human half cyborg cowboys and everything in-between! However every group succeeded fantastically in recreating their designs in cardboard. And you can see some of the designs made in our Technical Theatre Exhibition at the Stage2 Sharings on December 14th.
Stage1
'This week in Stage1 we let our crafty sides out, Christmas themed too! We made hats, personalised snow flakes, a group snow man (which might make an appearance in the Sharings) and our own mini snowmen. We also begun blocking and discussing the Sharings, and don't want to give too much away, but we are all looking forward to a great evening on the 14th!
Musical Theatre
This week in musical theatre, we had a discussion about the modern theatre industry and the causes for amount of theatre goers decreasing. We then learned some songs from popular musicals (including 'You can't stop the beat', 'Revolting Children' and 'One Short Day'). We then put our Sharings into an order and ran through what we're going to perform.
Tuesday 3 December 2013
Workshops
General Drama
Last week we had a huge session about the History of Theatre up to the 20th Century. After opening with a session about files and systems of organisation, we went to the main event. Based around a handout that separated the history into Greek, Medieval, Commedia dell'arte, Shakespearean & Jacobean, Restoration and Victorian, we went through section by section, doing a related activity after each - from exercises in group communication to reflect the work of Greek choruses to Medieval-style morality plays. We even managed to incorporate some well loved drama games, such as 'chaise longue' (The Restoration's version of park bench) to a melodrama edition of the freeze game. Through this we learned through both discussion of the handout and practice.
Musical Theatre
We learned Disney songs from 4 classic Disney films; Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid and High School Musical. After the learning the songs, we staged them in different ways and had a brilliant time performing. Finally, we looked through all the songs we've learned so far and decided what we'd like to put in the sharings. We're all very excited!
Technical Theatre
This week technical freelancer Sebastian Barnes introduced us to the world of Health as Safety. The base principal that ran throughout the session was that ‘regulations exist and are designed to protect workers safety’. This session not only applied to theatre but every asset of society. We learnt how to break down the mumbo jumbo of official documents to understand certain regulations. We covered some quite preposterous safety proposals like A council wanting to cover lamp posts in protective foam to stop people on their phones whilst walking; from walking in into them! We left this session having a much deeper understanding of safety regulations, how to identify and prevent hazards and how all of this relates to theatre and the many tools we use to create and facilitate performances.
Stage1
This week in Stage2 we have learnt how to waltz! A new skill Chloe has gained since starting at Birmingham School of Acting. The majority of Stage1 managed to pick it up fairly quickly and all looked very impressive when doing it as a whole group. We also begun to discuss what we would like to do in our end of term Sharings and started devising pieces for that. But this is all TOP SECRET and hope any parent, carers, family or friends can make it to the Sharings on the 14th to have the suspense revealed! Among all this we still managed to play several of the games Stage1 know and love and followed an important rule in Stage1: to have fun! “I think today has been really good because I’ve learnt how to ballroom dance and am now an expert at it.” – Zaraé Knox, Stage1 member.
Alexander Earle
Trainee Tutor
Social Networking and Auditions
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