Drama in lockdown

The lockdown has really hit the creative arts industry. The Oxford Playhouse, Pegasus Theatre, Burton-Taylor and other venues are all shut. There will probably be no Shakespeare season this summer with stages in the Bodleian Library, the Business School, college lawns. Many actors are without work, drama competitions have stopped receiving new submissions, and nobody knows what the next year will bring. Will theatres reopen across the city? Will we even have a panto this year?

2020-04 See all items with this value

Oxford

Stuart

The link is to an online play centred around ‘lockdown’ written specifically for the event. It was written very quickly, just for fun to keep minds active. I’ve worked a lot with Oxford amateur dramatic societies over the years so had good contacts with local actors. I’m also keeping in touch with online drama groups. It’s interesting to note a few online plays have appeared often looking at a similar scenario ‘actors in lockdown trying to rehearse a play’ which this one does. The BBC today (10th June) are also launching a new series called ‘Staged’ based around a similar plot.

The play was written rather quickly and responds to weekly events starting in April. We only had time for one read-through and then the actors set up Zoom sessions and recorded them.