lunchtime dancing

Twice a week, every week at lunch time, all of the dancers taking part in the production get together with the Mrs W, student choreographers and dancing stage managers to learn routines for the musical. the styles on dance vary from ballet to Irish dancing to hip hop and there are a lot of dancers involved in the production. So far a lot of dances have been choreographed. There is a ballet dance to ' Secret love' and Irish dancing to 'Deadwood stage'. It is all coming together really well and all of the dancers are working really hard to learn new dances.
A lot of work went into both of these dances and will be performed in the upcoming musical launch.

Rehearsals for minor roles

On Wednesday the 20th of November, there was a rehearsal for people who had signed up to play minor roles in the production. They started off with and spent a lot of time on acting exercises. This involved everyone walking around in circles pretending to be some sort of animal. They then began looking at the different characters that were needed- cowboys, saloon girls, prospectors and towns people. We set up a stage areas and everyone was given one of the four characters. They then practised different situations in character from the first scene of the musical.

After spending time on this, Mrs C asked everyone to sit in a circle to discuss the different roles and pick which role everyone wanted to be. She left the room so that they would decide themselves, saying that they wouldn't decide anything

with her there.

Saturday morning rehersals

On November 16th, all of the main cast and some of the production team arrived in the school hall at 10 O' clock to start main acting rehearsals. They began with some warm ups and then started practicing a scene between Calamity, Adelaide and Katie, played by Lauren, Rachael and Róisín. The scene starts with the Famous actress, Adelaide Adams. Adelaide gives some of  her costumes to her maid, Katie Brown who dreams of becoming a singer. She tries on one of the dresses and starts singing. Calamity, who is looking for Adelaide to come back to deadwood to perform, mistakes Katie for Adelaide.
After a well deserved break, Calamity and Bill, played by Lauren and Kyle, started practising a song called 'I can do without you'. The orchestra were also in the school practising. Lauren, Kyle, Roisín and Rachael went in to the orchestra to sing along with them.

Ready, Steady...GO!!!!

And finally rehersals are up and running. On Saturday the 9th of November, all of the main cast came together in a classroom in the St Wolstans for the first official read through of the script. This involved the script was read from cover to cover with everyone reading as their lines for the first time. This gave everyone a sense of the character that they are to portray in this production. It was the first time that the cast got together so it gave them the chance to get to know each other.
During the week beginning the 11th of november, singing rehersals took place for both the main cast, who had one on one rehersals, and the chorus who have started learning the opening song 'Deadwood stage'.
The dancing rehersals have also started, which take place at lunchtimes. There are a lot of different styles of dances being performed;from line dancing to ballet, irish dancing to hip hop. We had a great turn out for dancers so the dances are coming together well.

Auditions finished...Now the hard work begins!

For the past few weeks, auditions have been taking place to decide who would be playing the lead roles in the school musical, Calamity Jane. The first step was to recruit people who wanted to sign up and be involved in the musical. The acting and music stage managers took this job by the reigns and organised list of who wanted to do which audition.Then came auditions, with separate auditions for acting and singing. Students from both St Wolstan's Community school and Salesian college took part in these auditions. 
After the first round of auditions had been completed, a number of students were handpicked for a call back. These callbacks would determine who would play which role. Once the decision had been made, the list of the main cast was posted. Separate auditions also took place for supporting roles and also for dancing.
Well done to everyone who auditioned and congratulations to everyone who were cast as main roles.
Saturday is the first official rehearsal where the entire cast will read through the script together for the first time. It is definitely something to look forward to as the cast can really get a feel for their role.