Rangi Visit World Reknown Rada!

May 20, 2013

RANGI VISIT WORLD REKNOWN RADA

This Spring Rangu Ruru Girls’ School came all the way from Christ Church New Zealand came to England to be immersed in British drama, culture and history. Led by their dram teacher Robert Gilber, English teacher Erin Fitzpatrick and headteacher, Jule Moor, the theme of their tour was all thing theatrical and combined performance, workshops and backstage tours for a truly hands on experience.

For the most dedicated drama students, a workshop at RADA was a must. The Royal Academy of Dramatic art has trained and nurtured such talents as Anthony Hopkins, Ian Holm and more recently Ben Wishaw. The Rangi Ruru girls, aspiring to these heights were ready to take on the challenge of an intensive 3 hour acting technique workshop with one of the RADA tutors.

The workshop offered everyone a chance to flex all their acting muscles both physically and mentally and in the words of Robert Gilbert the workshop was ‘Fulfilling, enlightening, inspirational. Thank you – we hope to come again’ The students were equally enthusiastic saying ‘Phenomenal and enlightening. Loved the whole thing’ and ‘Loved every minute, the tutor was amazing. Thank you so so much.’

Rangi Ruru also had the opportunity to visit the National Theatre for a backstage tour that explored the inner workings of this versatile theatre space. Dedicated to new works and innovative productions this was a fitting backstage tour for the girls who later would be seeing Warhorse, a production that was first devised in the adjoining National Theatre Studios.

For drama teacher Rob Gilbert, the girls experience in London was all about hands on experience rather than watching life from an armchair, so the tour was paired with a puppetry workshop. Students made their own “warhorses” with balloons and sticks and then had to perform in pairs, working together to create living creatures from their inanimate models. This culminated in the an evening performance where they could see all the magic come together as the horses they had seen in the backstage prop store, became beautiful living creatures with all the subtlety and psychology of real horses.

Working hard in the daytime to learn all they could about British culture, history and theatre, in the evening Rangi Ruru were finally given a chance to sit back and enjoy the show. With more then forty five theatres in the West End alone one can easily see why London lays claim to being the theatre capital of the world. For many London is the place where theatre really began and Rangi Ruru were her to take advantage of every second seeing award winning performances of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night, Othello with Adrian Lester opposite Rory Kinnear, and the record breaking Les Miserables to name just a few.