School Plays

Each year's program includes three major school plays (or a musical): Senior, Junior and Lower-Sixth productions.

The Senior Play

The Senior Play (or ‘School Play’) is in the Spring Term and tends to be the largest production in the school year. The cast and crew are usually from the top three year groups. In the past, we have been proud to present the following productions: The Visit (Durrenmatt), Tis Pity She’s a Whore (Ford), The Hypochondriac (Molière) and Return to the Forbidden Planet (a Musical by Bob Carlton). The School also produced its own Opera in 2004 - Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.

In 2010, the School Play was King Lear by Shakespeare (directed by Gavin Henry).

The Junior Play

The Junior Play is for boys in the 3rd & 4th Forms and tends to attact the largest numbers to auditions. These plays feature a large cast, with many boys cutting their teeth in a large scale production or with a significant acting challenge. We also believe in introducing juniors to the importance of working as an ensemble (rather than counting how many lines each part has) and using an actor’s primary set of skills (voice, physicality, movement and space) as inventively as possible. In the past, we have been delighted with productions such as The Government Inspector (Gogol) and Twelfth Night (Shakespeare). In 2008, Dido, Queen of Carthage (by Christopher Marlowe), was the first all-male production of the play since it was originally written for a leading Elizabethan boys company of its day. In 2009, the juniors tackled the RSC’s adaptation of Malorie Blackman’s popular novel Noughts & Crosses with a cast of 34, working with half-masks which they had made and designed themselves. Many of the company came from the ranks of the Junior Drama Society, which was launched that year.

In 2010, the Junior Play is The Kitchen by Arnold Wesker (May 2010) (directed by Lawrence Thornbury).

The Lower Sixth Play

The Lower Sixth Play often features a production that is more experimental in either form and/or content than the other two school productions. In the past this has featured Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia; a promenade, adapted version of a Shakespeare’s Dream (Fierce Vexation of a Dream) - which took place around the whole E M Forster building and featured original music, dance, film and design created by the LVI cast; the next year saw Romeo & Juliet in which the audience became guests at Capulet’s feast and followed the coffin into Juliet’s tomb. Since then, the LVI play has seen boys take on direction and lead to some very successful studio plays. One of which, Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me (by Frank McGuinness), was taken by boys to the Edinburgh Festival in 2007 as an OT production (see Hog Head). Last year, James Hamel (FH4) directed three LVI boys in a superb production of Joe Penhall’s Blue / Orange.

In 2010, the Lower Sixth play was directed by Mike Morrison and devised and written by him and the cast, based on the experiences of families of British servicemen and women serving in Afghanistan.

More information about Drama as an academic subject

More information about Co-Curricular drama