On Tuesday the 4th November 2014, our class were preparing to travel to the Newbury Corn Exchange, to perform A Midsummer Night’s Dream; a Shakespeare play. The Shakespeare schools festival is to mark the 450 year anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. Other schools’ plays were Titus Andronicus and The Winters Tale; we were the only primary school there.

Once we had arrived at the Newbury corn exchange, we were shown our dressing room’s the ladies had one but the boys had two of them. We got dressed and ready how we wanted to look for the show, putting our make-up on and sorting out our hair; Olivia was a male so she wasn’t allowed to put make-up on. We were being recorded after the tech rehearsal. The tech rehearsal was so that they could organise when they were going to change the lighting and have the music strike up and fade down, we were also told that when the red light faded we would be able to begin. The lights were so bright that they blinded us.

Mr Baxter filmed us do our dress rehearsal (which will be up for sale soon in the office) I felt like I was actually being watched by 400 people!

After enjoying our packed dinner we made our way back to the stage ,where the two other secondary schools awaited our arrival. We came onto the stage and had a warm up called Rubber chicken, the game is to shake you left hand eight time then your right then your left leg and your right leg you repeat that but half the shakes,so four times on your left then right and on you legs, you then shake them twice and then once but once you have completed it you do a star jump and say Shakespeare.

We returned to the dressing room to get redressed and put the finishing touches to our costumes, make-up and get ready for the performance!

The wait in the wings was so nerve-wracking but I was really exited for the show. A shiver eventually fell down my spine as a the red light faded, Olivia and Holly entered the stage, my heart was beating a million pumps a second. Once I had exited the stage my fright had relieved, I felt so confident i just felt as if no-one was watching like I was alone on stage.

The crowed sounded like they loved it and enjoyed it as much as I did. We were so lucky to get this opportunity to perform in front of such a lovely crowd and have so much fun doing so.

I would like to say a big thank you to Mrs Dabill, Mrs Lobb, Mrs Henrys and Mr Hickman for supporting us and being such great staff to supervise us 🙂

-Lauren