Schools gear up for Shakespeare fest
Durban schools are gearing up for the Shakespeare Schools Festival this month.
DURBAN schools are set to get an enormous boost from this year’s Shakespeare Schools Festival South Africa (SSF SA), which will run from 22 to 23 May at the Seabrook’s Theatre, DHS, from 7pm.
Taking part in the much awaited performances will be Glenwood High School, Eden College, Durban Girls’ High School and Crawford North Coast Prep.
The Shakespeare Schools Festival South Africa was initiated and coordinated by Educape, with the aim of providing an equal opportunity where there are no boundaries for participation. The festival, in its fifth consecutive season, has reached over 1000 high school pupils and teachers in the Western Cape, Gauteng, Eastern Cape and Kwa-Zulu-Natal.
“The dramatic increase in feedback compared to previous years shows that more participants than before are beginning to realise that access to the arts is a fundamental human right and that theatre can contribute significantly to human development and motivation. We believe that unless children are given the opportunity to fall in love with the theatre experience at an early age, we will have no theatre industry in the future,” said Kseniya Filinova-Bruton, festival director.
The festival was established in the United Kingdom as an additional education programme, aimed at improving language and social skills through the performing arts. Each year, the festival encourages schools to perform 30 minute versions of Shakespearean plays in their local professional theatres, thereby giving them a platform to voice their creativity to a captive audience and alongside that opportunity to broaden their horizons by experiencing the magic of live theatre, professional lighting and an audience.
The second SSF SA will be held in Durban at The Playhouse Company in September this year, with nine more schools taking on the challenge of performing Shakespeare in the professional theatre environment.
For more information on the festival and ticket bookings (R50 and R40 concessions), contact Kseniya Filinova-Bruton at info@educape.co.za
