CAS Reflection: MSND Backstage Help

A MidSummer Nights Dream

            Once again our school performed their annual school play, this year being A MidSummer Nights Dream by William Shakespeare, which they turned into a musical. When talk of the play first began at school back in September, I had always planned to audition for a part, or at least participate in the dancing. However, I became extremely busy with schoolwork and never actually got the chance to be a part of the play.

            My role throughout this whole production was backstage help and managing/organizing all the microphones. It was definitely a difficult job. In the previous plays, this has always been my job however I was more aware of the script and storyline. This time I did not know much about the play and therefore it was a lot more challenging. The mic’s were very annoying as some times they worked and others they didn’t, and 2 actually broke, leaving us with 4!

            The first night, myself and my partner Lily decided to just wing it because our previous mic list got messed up. This night was definitely a success and worked out perfectly! However can we do it perfectly 2 nights in a row? – Almost! The second night, the mic’s had more technical problems and we were a bit too relaxed that we had some minor mishaps, where people forgot to put mics on. 

            Overall, we did a great job, it was hectic and confusing but we got through without any majorly noticeable mistakes, hopefully next year there will be more mics available. 

CAS Reflection MSND Painting Backdrop

MidSummer Nights Dream Backdrop Painting

            This year my school performed the play, “A MidSummer Nights Dream” by William Shakespeare. Of course every play needed backdrops and stage sets to give it the affect and atmosphere required. However, instead of having parents paint these backdrops, a group of 5 IB Art students, including myself, along with out art teacher Ms. Gouldstone were given the job of painting.

            Our task was to paint two pieces of canvas, both 12ft by 20ft (WOAH THAT’S HUGE). One was a scene of Ancient Greece, with the blue sky and pillars; the other was that of an old English woodland forest, with a moon, dark night sky and lots of trees.  We began on a Saturday, and cleared 2 classrooms to lay the canvases out on the floor and taped them down with duct tape. The process was tedious and long. We had to prime both with white paint and then draw out the scenes. The priming was easy but did take quite a while. I enjoyed the drawing, however it was quite difficult transferring such a small image onto such a huge canvas. With all the difficulties however we got threw and managed to draw out two amazing scenes.

            The painting was probably my favorite part; we used such perfect colors on each scene and managed to portray a 3-D effect to the pieces. It took about 2 weeks, however we only worked on Saturdays and at random times throughout the week. In the end the play was phenomenal and the backdrops were the icing on the cake providing realism to the sets.