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The Importance of Being Earnest, and other
lessons - May 25, 2009
On Tuesday, May 22, Linden's senior drama
classes and Senior Drama Club hosted the year's second Senior
Drama Night.
The evening's programme began with the Senior
Drama Club's presentation of John Murray's A Case for Two
Detectives, a comedy in which two sleuths with two very
different styles endeavour to solve the same bizarre murder.
Later in the evening, the club also presented Four Women
And Their Men, an original play by grade 10 student Alannah;
her script explores what happens when four women, with personalities
and histories based on three tragic Shakespearean characters
(Lady Macbeth, Desdemona and Cleopatra) and on Shakespeare's
own wife, Anne, meet the recently engaged and deliriously
happy Julie (Juliet) at a nail salon. Embittered by their
own experiences, the women try to convince Julie that love
isn't worth her time or effort, and Julie must decide whether
to buy in to their jaded views.
Grade 9 drama students presented plays
they wrote themselves. The girls focused on a wide range of
ideas and themes, taking us behind the scenes of American
Idol, showing us how the fashion industry can negatively
affect self-esteem and exploring the moral struggles of a
group deciding whether to end the world for the good of humanity.
The second portion of the evening explored
Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, with
students in grades 10, 11 and 12 performing three interpretations
of this classic work. The first, Earnest in Ten Minutes,
was the most faithful to the original play. Staying true
to the original 19th-century, English setting, this short
play compressed the lengthy Earnest into a rapid-fire
ten minutes of deceit and hilarity.
The next two interpretations strayed a bit
farther from the original. The second group performed a scene
from playwright Tom Stoppard's Travesties, in which
the main character, Henry Carr, begins to confuse events in
his life with those of Earnest as a result of his starring
role in the play. In a different approach, the final group
decided to modernize Earnest, setting it in a 21st-century
high school and pitting two fake Ernests against each other
in their pursuit of a prom date.
Congratulations to the Senior Drama Club
and senior drama classes for a wonderful night of drama, and
thanks to drama teacher Jenn for all the hard work she put
into this event.
An evening of drama en français
- May 7, 2009
On Tuesday, May 5, Linden students in grades
3-8 showed off their French language skills at the school's
annual Junior French Drama Night.
The evening's MCs, grade 5 students Nishina,
Kathryn and Melissa, took the audience through six wonderful
plays performed entirely in French, beginning with Grade 3/4.
This class presented the play Chat Angora, a story
about a world-famous detective who is trying to track down
the evil Madame Rat, but unfortunately is not quite as bright
as he believes himself to be.
After a strong start by the 3/4 class,
it was grade 6's turn. Grade 6B performed an updated version
of the classic fairy tale Rumplestiltskin; in the modernized
story, Rumplestilskinny, it is not a miller's daughter
but a lawyer's daughter who is asked to spin straw into iPods
by Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Unable to do so, she turns
to the help of the two-headed Rumplestilskinny. Grade 6R also
put a fairy-tale spin on the evening; in their L'échange
de femme de contes de fées, an adaptation of the
reality show Wife Swap, Goldilocks and Sleeping Beauty
are forced to change places - and neither finds herself at
home in the other's story.
The two grade 7 classes then took the stage
with their productions. Grade 7C wrote and performed Veux-tu
aller au Carnaval?, in which the hapless François
tries to impress his dream girl, Suzie, only to find out she
prefers it when he doesn't try so hard. Grade 7E followed
with L'Habit de L'Empereur, their adaptation of The
Emperor's New Clothes; the naive emperor unwittingly finds
himself wearing an invisible suit out in public - and with
the full support of the fashion police!
The evening closed with Grade 8's La
Belle au Bois Dormant, again continuing the fairy-tale
theme. The girls wrote and performed their own version of
Charles Perrault's lesser-known ending to Sleeping Beauty,
in which Sleeping Beauty is forced to remain in hiding
long after she wakes, along with her two children, because
her husband the Prince's mother is an ogress.
Students in grades 6, 7 and 8 adapted and
wrote the scripts for their plays, and did a great job bringing
their works to life. The girls sincerely thank Anne Van Burek
and Lindsay Hastings, the two French teachers who worked with
junior students on their plays, for working tirelessly to
make this evening a reality.
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