Story writing workshops
NEW for the 2024 festival and open to everyone!
These are non-competitive workshops, designed to allow young people aged 7 to 16 the opportunity to develop their writing skills, benefit from working with professional writers and most of all, have some fun!
The above link to the syllabus is only for the workshops. The combined festival syllabus can be found here.
Places are limited and MUST be booked online via Play&Perform. A brief overview of each workshop can be found below.
Junior Workshop - Ages 7-11
Kevin and Seraphim are The Story Knights, the Knights who tell Stories. The creative session is aimed at 7–11-year-olds. It is based on a book entitled ‘Max & Luchia: The Game Makers’, a story that is all about the power of young people’s imagination. We will discuss the main characters in the book, the fairy tale world within the story and how we created the ideas using our own imagination.
Next, we’ll read a section from the book and then it is over to you, and your wonderful young creative minds to create something of your own. You can write down your ideas, draw them as pictures or even act them out amongst yourselves.
All we ask is that you use the power of your own imagination. At the end of the performance, we will ask whether any of you would like to show us your ideas. In this way, you will become the stars of the show.
Senior Workshop - Ages 12-16
Together with the audience, we will focus on the future and begin with our own, dystopian vision of life, 20 years from now. We will concentrate on the main themes within 'The Objectors', including identity, survival, climate change and social division in society. Then, it will be over to you to create your own vision of the future.
The synopsis of The Objectors is as follows:
The year is 2042. England is cut off from the former UK, Europe and the world. As resources dwindle, The Entitlement Party creates a devastating scheme to reduce the population. On their sixteenth birthday, young people of underling class are selected at random to eliminate six people. The reward for fulfilling their contract is to win their place amongst the elite.
Samarah, Ethan and Ellie-Mae, each of whom has a different reason to object, refuse to sign the contract. As civilisation crumbles, and a programme of genocide is uncovered, the regime deploys its synthetic warriors to destroy an underling rebellion. The only force that can prevent victory for evil, is the spirit and collective strength of three young people. The Objectors.