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Mansfield children stage Shakespeare in lockdown

Posted onPosted on 17th Nov

Thousands of children from more than 200 schools nationwide will be performing the works of Shakespeare this coming week in a unique initiative.

One Night of Shakespeare, to be broadcast online at 7pm on Friday, 20 November, will include youngsters from Mansfield schools.

In a year of unprecedented disruption due to the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns, Coram Shakespeare Schools Foundation (CSSF) has adapted its annual festival for the event. Children and teachers have worked remotely and under Covid-secure conditions to rehearse performances that demonstrate their creativity and show that theatre lives, despite the closure of arts venues.

The annual festival is the flagship project of award-winning charity CSSF. In a usual year, after months of preparation, children perform on professional stages in arts venues up and down the country.

Throughout the pandemic, the charity has worked to innovate and adapt its programme so that children can continue to gain the crucial life skills that the arts and performance give. This has included creative online CPD sessions with teachers, sending specialist theatre practitioners into schools to run workshops, and providing a wealth of resources to enable teachers to guide their students through the Festival journey and become directors in their own right.

Schools have responded with creativity and ingenuity, filming their performances, rehearsing in bubbles and online and finding innovative ways to persevere, providing their school and wider local community with moments of joy and celebration in what continues to be an otherwise dark time.

You can watch the live broadcast at 7pm on 20 November at shakespeareschools.org/livestream.