Amateur dramatics may
still conjure up images of chintzy middle England matriarchs
over-playing Alan Ayckbourn in draughty village halls, but it remains
one of Britain's most popular past-times. Some two thousand groups
estimated to be producing work, while in Scotland, the Scottish
Community Drama Association is a major hub of am dram activity.
Some of the best am
dram groups are currently on show in Nation's Best Am Dram, a six
part TV series on Sky Arts HD, which pits teams against each other in
a competition judged and mentored by high-profile theatre
professionals. With three very different Scottish groups making it
down to the last eight, and with performance in a London West End the
prize for the winner, am dram is a very serious business for everyone
involved.
By way of actor and
director Kathy Burke's throaty narration, the first two episodes of
Nation's Best Am Dram have introduced viewers to Edinburgh Graduate
Theatre Group (EGTG), the Glasgow-based Strathclyde Theatre Group
(STG) and, from Castle Douglas in Galloway, Crossmichael Theatre
Group. STG and Crossmichael were selected along with another five
from video submissions judged by actor Miriam Margolyes and critic
Quentin Letts, with producer Bill Kenwright chairing the panel. In a
spirit of democracy, EGTC were selected by the public.
“We've always seen
that as a positive,” says David Grimes, a lawyer and EGTG's
director. “At the end of the day it's the public buying the
tickets, so obviously they saw something that the judges missed first
time round.”
For the quarter finals,
half of the competitors were tasked to present a scene from Ibsen's
An Enemy of the People, while the other half had to do likewise with
a scene from Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard. After three weeks
rehearsals, each company was assigned a professional mentor, who
appraised their progress while offering advice.
While EGTG were looked
after by former Heartbeat star and National Theatre regular, Niamh
Cusack, STG were watched over by Royal Shakespeare Company stalwart,
Dame Harriet Walter. Crossmichael, meanwhile, found Peep Show star
Paterson Joseph, another RSC regular, making the trek to Galloway to
work with Crossmichael.
“He worked us really
hard,” says Crossmichael director and full time carer, Anne
McIntyre. “I do farce and comedy. That's my thing, and I tend to
move people around all the time, but Paterson taught me the
importance of being still.”
STG too are full of
praise for their mentor.
“It was wonderful to
have such an experienced actor as Dame Harriet Walters to help us,”
says STG director Bruce Downie. “She took a lot of time to work
with people individually, and that made an invaluable difference.”
Grimes describes Cusack
as “absolutely the best mentor. She changed what we did
completely, and it was so enlightening to see her process. There's a
running joke now when we're rehearsing something, and someone will
say 'How would Niamh do it?”
For Cusack herself,
Nation's Best Am Dram was something of an eye-opener.
“It's making people
interested in theatre,” she says. “Am dram is a social thing as
much as anything. It allows people to use their imaginations and
broadens people's lives, and I think it's important that people all
over the country, especially in areas which perhaps don't have access
to professional theatre, are getting up and doing it for themselves.”
Walters concurs.
“Am dram forms
communities,” she says, “and it allows people to have some kind
of creative release beyond the rest of their lives. A programme like
this might make people watching it think 'that could be me up
there'.”
In the third episode of
Nation's Am Dram, shown tomorrow, viewers will be able to see Cusack
put STG and EGTG through their paces with The Cherry Orchard. Walters
will be seen doing likewise with STG, who are forced to make a
last-minute cast change. Best of all in this week's programme is
Richard Wilson's response to one group's reimagining of The Cherry
Orchard in a sanatorium peopled by delusional patients.
How, though, have the
groups fared since the series was filmed more than a year ago?
Since Nation's Am Dram
ended, STG have been forced to vacate their home at the Strathclyde
University owned Ramshorn Theatre, but the company is still going
strong, and have just completed a run of Arthur Miller's Death of A
Salesman directed by Downie at Cottiers Theatre.
“It's been a
difficult eighteen months,” says Downie. “We lost what had been
our home for the last twenty years, and a lot of members drifted
away, but the competition came along at exactly the right time. It
regenerated focus for the group, and I think gave people a new sense
of purpose.”
EGTG remain similarly
galvanised, and this year alone have put on productions of Doctor
Faustus and Jez Butterworth's play, Jerusalem, while only last week
they staged Shakespeare's Richard III.
“We do four shows a
year, anyway,” says Grimes, “so even while filming, we were
rehearsing for our next production at the same time.”
For Crossmichael, whose
members are more geographically spread out than STG and the Edinburgh
Grads, the experience has been very different.
“We usually only do
festivals between January and March,” says McIntyre, “so we
haven't really met much recently. By the end of this, having spent so
much time together, I think we'd been in each other's company too
long, but we've met to choose a script for the SCDA, and now it's
back to business as usual. We were talking about putting something on
at the [Edinburgh Festival] Fringe this year. If there's any year
we're going to do it, this has to be the one.”
Nation's Best Am Dram,
Sky Arts HD, Wednesdays at 9pm
The Herald, November 27th 2012
ends
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