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Common Room Play: 'Artistic Licence'
Tuesday 6 July 2010
The last Common Room play was about fourteen years ago and mutterings about doing another one grew steadily in the Autumn term. What play has parts for twenty-four people, none of whom want a big part and most of whom are too busy to commit to a rehearsal schedule?
While invigilating the January Mocks in Big School I mulled over what we could do and the result was Artistic Licence, which turned eleven of us into works of art, seven into dubious celebrities, one into a Marketing expert, one into a suspect art historian, one into a cleaner, one into a muddled floosie and one into a gallery attendant to prompt us. The last one had said he would only have a speaking part if his lines were the most important in the play, hence the photographer who proclaimed “The end” at the end!
Rehearsals were fitted in here and there but the first time we were all on stage together in Big School, post-exams, was the first night. We recruited Thomas Fayle for the sound and light, also happening for the first time; he was fantastic but then succumbed to illness so the next night Nicholas Henwood and Daniel Smith got the job of sounding and lighting a production they had never seen. The Common Room thanks all three of these pupils for the terrific job they did.
Writing the play was the easiest part of the process. The cast added their own lines as and when they felt like it. Indeed, Steve Kelly’s lines had never existed at all on the script because the first intended Laughing Cavalier had only wanted a non-speaking part; Steve brought his irrepressible presence to the stage, as did Father Huw, whose Van Gogh went into realms I had never envisaged.
Creating the set was a team effort, as was the direction and production. We were delighted that the production raised £400 for the Hyperbaric Chamber – and delighted, too, that we had such fun. By the time the next fourteen years have passed I shall be out to grass and can look forward to being in the audience instead of a tent for the next Common Room production!
Claire Humphreys-Jones
Money raised from the non-uniform day held on Friday 25 June now puts the total to over £700.
