Anne’s Letter
CELEBRATION!! After 5 years of stagnation, Innovations has a new, up-dated website! Kudos to Laura Kenny (mother of student Oscar Kenny) for this much-needed face lift.
It would take volumes to recount everything that has happened over the past half-decade, so suffice it to say that Innovations Theatre School has gone from strength to strength and continues to grow in talent, enthusiasm and creativity. We are blessed with beautiful children – 43 in the Arklow School and 84 in the Gorey School. We are also blessed with an extraordinary staff of talented, dedicated teachers who tutor and encourage our children to express their individualism through the joy of performance. Our teachers recognise that every child is wonderfully unique.
At the moment, we are hip-deep in preparations for our up-coming show, Midsummer Madness (With Apologies to Shakespeare) which will go on stage in the Gorey Little Theatre the first week of February. However, we have still found time to engage in other activities as well. In October, under the baton of singing teacher John Hughes, a choir of students from the Arklow school performed before a packed house in the Arklow Bay Hotel on behalf of the annual Loaves & Fishes charity concert. Loaves & Fishes is a free, weekly, community meal run by Bridge Christian Community every Tuesday evening. This takes place in the Centre where we hold our Wednesday classes.
The Gorey senior students also did their part for charity – this time for the Courtown and Riverchapel First Responders. As ghouls, ghosts and other creepy creatures, their job was to haunt Pirates Cove and to send the adrenalin soaring in the multitude of visitors attending a Halloween party. Screams and laughter were the order of the day.
Also in October, senior students and parents from both schools travelled by coach to the Bord Gáis Theatre in Dublin to see the stage version of The Commitments starring Amy Penston whom many of our students will remember from our recent Summer Camp. Versatile Amy taught both singing and drama. Also in The Commitments cast was Amy’s sister Leah Penston who is one of our illustrious past pupils.
And we were able to take on one more extra-curricular activity before the Christmas break. On December 8th, another coach load of students and parents (45 of us!) headed off once again to the Bord Gáis Theatre to see Big, a musical based on the movie that starred Tom Hanks.
Once we return from the Christmas holiday, it’s full steam ahead on the “big show” preparation. More on the madness of presenting “Midsummer” in the middle of winter (!!) in the next letter. Till then . . .
A merry Christmas to you all!
Anne