Before the Summer holidays, Paige and 4 members of the Senior group were really fortunate to attend a final ‘Thank you and Goodbye’ event from Company Three! Company Three allowed us to explore their Coronavirus Time Capsule for our Summer Term work and the group (and leaders) had the best time making and creating videos to watch back about our time in lockdown!
Maya has written a lovely piece below about her experience of the Time Capsule and the event … watch out for her Hamilton style rap!
In July, I was picked to be one of the youth theatre members to take part in Company 3’s closing of the time capsule. I had loved taking part in their Coronavirus Time Capsule so I was really excited for the workshop. It certainly didn’t disappoint! It was truly epic to see just a small (if you can call nearly 200 people small) fraction of the 215 companies who had taken part. I knew that lots of youth theatres were involved, but I hadn’t understood quite how many until there were 7 pages of 25 faces on my zoom screen! Before the call, we were asked to write a short piece – a song or a poem or a rap or writing all about what the Coronavirus Time Capsule had meant to us. I remembered we had a special guest that would be joining the event … Jamael Westman! Who originated the role of Hamilton on the West End. I saw the prompt ‘rap’ and thought perhaps I could have some fun with this?
It was during the event that we showcased our little 30 second tributes to the time capsule. People were so creative! We had a really nice discussion about the impact of the films we had created, and how the project could continue in different forms. And I performed my Hamilton inspired rap! I thought… cool! That part is over!
We then left our rooms and came back to the main call, unsure what our next task was. We had heard from Jamael already… he gave us a great talk about the power of young people using their voices, especially through theatre, and how we could make change happen. We then got to see some of the work everyone had prepared … there were some gorgeous poems, songs and a piece of writing, and then I heard the words: ‘someone has written a Hamilton rap?’! I was both terrified and giddy as I said it was me. They called Jamael forward to make sure he saw (!) and then I did it! And it was such a good feeling, Jamael was cheering loads at the end, and all the Growtheatre folk were cheering me on in the chat, along with other people.
Thank you Rachel and Paige for putting me in a place where I could experience something like that and not only interact with an inspiration of mine, but to also be a part of such a huge and awesome project and closing ceremony. We ended with the Coronavirus Time Capsule website being officially opened as Jamael Westman played us an acoustic version of History Has Its Eyes On You. What an awesome afternoon!
– Maya, Senior Youth Theatre Member