Day 1 - First Impressions, Mirrors and Devising

It is only fitting to begin this blog with a recap of the first session working with Escape: Contemporary Youth Theatre and Anthony Haddon (director, from 'The Blahs'), in which we started to piece together the performance for the Transnational Holocaust Memorial Conference in January 2015.

Simon, the artistic director of Escape:CYT, began the session by introducing Anthony and I to the group of young people who attend weekly sessions at Lawnswood School. After Anthony explained the exciting new project to the group, I played some games with the young people to get some creative ideas rolling and to get some energy in the room.

If you've ever seen the TV programme, 'Whose line is it anyway?', then you may be familiar with the game, 'helping hands'. Player 1 cannot use his or her arms, placing them back their back, whilst Player 2 provides the arms for Player 1 and links them through the armpits; creating a humourous mess of gesticulating limbs pretending to put trousers on or trying to open the fridge. The group seemed to love it, and it's a fun way to get them to think 'outside the box'. Next we played the classic, 'Freeze', where the group took turns in improvising in the middle of the circle, much to my amusement.

I don't think I've ever met such an intelligent group of young people. This isn't meant to sound patronising but I'm sure that I was never that clever when I was 13, when the hardest decision was whether I wanted to have beans to eat for lunch that day. This group of  12-15 year olds are exceptional, debating really tough and serious subjects matters with mature and thought-provoking answers. Anthony asked the group whether they thought War Memorials should be beautiful, or portray the brutality of war. Most of the group asserted that, "Yes, war memorials should be beautiful to remember the sacrifice people had to make, and to respect their lives." but when probed further, some of the kids spoke out to say that "war memorials need to represent the horror of war,  showing: this is what happened and it should never happen again.".

"Holocaust Memorials shouldn’t be beautiful – they should 

be real."

"We are humanity – and we are put on earth to be human and all should be treated equally- everybody is exactly the same – they should be rewarded or punished. Everyone should be equal."

Next, Anthony read out 'The Sheet of Glass" by Edward Bond, a highly imaged poem concerning the theme of mirrors and self-reflections. Broken down stanza by stanza, the group were split into 4 sections and were asked to come up with freezeframes to convey ideas expressed within each verse. For example, one group interpreted the following except from stanza 4 to express the feeling of being trapped in one's own reflection by representing the evolution of man.

"Through the broken gaps you see what’s beyond the mirror 

- you see other people there and what’s happening. 

And in the broken mirror still in place you see yourself. 

But only bits of yourself. 

For every bit you see of what’s beyond the mirror you have to lose a bit of 

 yourself. 

It can’t be otherwise. 

It is the law of opposites."



When put into context with Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass (a brutal anti-semitic attack by Nazi Germany on 9-10 November 1938), the group responded by recognising 'opposite' themes of violence versus victim.

This week was the first 'Devising Week', which means that each aspect discussed in the next few sessions before the 'Rehearsal Weeks', will be incorporated into the final production as a fundamental theme. Taking this into consideration, we should keep in mind that we are essentially creating a memorial. We're going to encounter something brief and temporary but the weight of the message is eternal. We're creating something that isn't set into concrete like a statue or cenotaph, but becomes alive on a stage for 15 minutes and then it is gone except for in our minds. The memory and awareness will live on eternally - neither brutal nor beautiful but powerful and strong.