On Wednesday 3 January, whilst we were still recovering from New Year celebrations, Years 12 and 13 were snapped awake by a Physical Theatre workshop led by Frantic Assembly’s Vicki Manderson.

The award winning theatre company are studied as leading contemporary theatre practitioners on five British and international academic syllabuses and are known for works such as; Things I Know To Be True (Seen by our students in October), Othello, Beautiful Burnout, Lovesong, Stockholm and The Believers. They also provided movement direction on the award-winning National Theatre of Great Britain production The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Their distinct style and use of physicality is what makes them so popular in contemporary theatre and is perfect for providing an opportunity for Drama students to explore alternative ways of story-telling.

During the workshop students learnt to warm up their bodies and minds, exercises they can apply to their own rehearsals for their examined performances. They were also taught the principles of lifting, enabling them to carry out small lifts in pairs, as well as larger group lifts. Students worked on some fantastic duet work which demonstrated the skills they had learnt and finished the session on a group performance focusing on moments of interaction and building context. There was a wonderful buzz in the air and it was great to see Years 12 and 13 working together. I look forward to seeing them apply their newly learnt skills in their future performances.

Click here to see a gallery of photos from the workshop.

Miss White