Teen – Drama Production

TEEN TEEN TEEN

PRESENTED BY CANBERRA GRAMMAR SCHOOL

FROM THE GREAT MIND OF KRISTEN DOHERTY

44 STORIES FROM THE LIVES OF TEENAGERS LOVE LOSS & LIFE

Devising and performing a play in 2022 comes with its own set of challenges. After a false start in 2021, which entailed audition week coinciding with the week Canberra went back into lockdown, it has been great to get the ball rolling again.

We completed auditions over zoom. We held most rehearsals separated by year group. We rehearsed in masks for the whole process. We never even had the whole cast together to rehearse! But this all just goes to show how important performances and productions are to CGS. We persevered through every challenge we faced, and have come out the other side having shared the experience.

TEEN and BULLY are the two plays of Kristen Doherty’s that we used to base our production on. The first thing that stood out about each play is the clear intention to explore the lived experiences of Teenagers, and to portray those in a way that is both truthful to the performers and galvanising for audiences. The second thing to make sure this was the right play for us was the freedom Doherty has written into the play itself. She encourages Directors and Performers to alter the script to better suit their intentions.

This is an unusual capability for a play to offer, so we made the absolute most by having students and myself write scenes into the play, as well as making adjustments made to better suit our cast and audiences. From this, we had created a play that was ours, one that we felt connected with, and one that aimed to truly examine the lives of modern-day students.

Though we didn’t get to stage the play, we are working towards filming our scenes and compiling a movie—a CGS first! We look forward to sharing our play with you all, one way or another, in the near future. We would like to thank the families and friends of the cast for their support, guidance (and transportation) throughout the process of bringing this play to life.