Voices Across the Waves
UK and Philippines Connect Up Collaboration Project
by Vitalils Waweru
We aimed at generating ideas for the young people in UK and Philippines to work beyond the five sessions and make their own piece of theatre. These ideas and materials would give the adult company in the UK materials to make a piece of theatre to tour as part of Connect Up.
In Cathedral School, the workshop would run from 7th February to 19th March 2024. During this time, Derby and Philippines groups would exchange ideas via video calls in real time. These sessions would also include the writer in attendance. Away from these sessions, the two theatres and the schools would have a meeting each week to discuss the previous session and plan for the following session to ensure we were on the same creative page.
The rehearsals for the Derby Theatre show would start in April, and the young people would get a chance to attend those rehearsals. They would also watch the show they helped create.
Recorded videos were exchanged which added more value to our sessions than planned. The young people could create at their own pace and even add more creativity. For instance, encouraging the students in Derby who spoke Tagalog went on to inspire the writer to use the student’s voices in the final performance. At the end of a session, the student said “Thank you for always listening to my ideas.” Language was sometimes a barrier, so sending pre-recorded videos of our performances with translations already added helped to fix this and helped produce even more creativity. All the creative insights gathered during the process gave the Philippines group enough to create their own performance. The Derby group also went on to create a scene in response to a small excerpt Ryan shared with them.
A performance was made and presented back to pupils Cathedral School students. The responses we received gave us further insight.
Some challenges faced in the project include not having enough time, specifically the Derby Group, who only had 40 minutes for a session (9.10am – 9.50am). At some point, we also realized that the dates for our sessions had to be changed because half-term hadn’t been considered.
As a theatre mediator, having the playwright in the space proved to be very resourceful to the process. As the source of the output (the script/story) he could experience the sessions and fully engage with the young people. After sessions, he and I would chat for hours as we investigated what we got from the students, and how we needed to approach the following. Working with him closely ensured that we were on the same page.
The drama teacher at Cathedral School (Alex Wrampling) thought it was an exciting experience and opportunity for the young people. She commented: “…and how incredible that this piece of work was helped shape by some of our students, and that they got to see how a professional production might be created from scratch, and the creative journey it goes on (with all the hard work and teams of people involved)! Very impressive indeed!”
