CANBERRA’S annual “Come Alive” museum theatre festival for schools is coming up this week in the Courtyard Studio of the Canberra Theatre Centre.
While over the past 10 years the festival has been staged in various cultural institutions around the nation’s capital, it is now hosted and staged by Canberra Theatre in collaboration with institutions such as, this year, the National Library.
Founder-director of the event, Peter Wilkins, says that while the onus of providing a venue and the technical back-up so essential for staging plays is borne by Canberra Theatre, the cultural institutions are responsible for access to their collections, also providing resource assistance and marketing.
The idea is for participating schools to create theatre pieces inspired by the chosen collection for the year, with original mini-plays written by students and their teachers around object, people and stories researched in the museums, galleries and collecting bodies.
Some schools will choose an object, as with Telopea School’s “The Curse of the Convict Jacket”.
Others may focus on an individual, as Canberra Girls Grammar School does with “The Crocodile” about serial killer Ivan Milat.
Even more look at historical events, as in Orana Steiner School’s “Rebellion Down Under”.
The 2019 Come Alive! Festival of Museum Theatre, Courtyard Studio, Canberra Theatre Centre, 6pm-7pm, September 24-28. Book at canberratheatrecentre.com.au
The full program
Tuesday, September 24
Canberra Girls Grammar School, “The Crocodile” and “In My House”.
Daramalan College, video screening of “Querelle des Femmes”. The live production will be staged on Friday, September 27.
Wednesday, September 25
Ulladulla High School, “Suffragette Sash” and “HMAS Kooper”.
Radford College, “Whose Story?”.
Batemans Bay High School, “The Great Emu War”.
Thursday, September 26
St Clare’s College, “Story Time. Morris Gleitzman and Mem Fox”.
Telopea School, “The Curse of the Convict Jacket”.
Merici College, “The Death of a Daisy.”
Friday, September 27
Orana Steiner School, “Rebellion Down Under”.
Daramalan College, “Querelles des Femmes” (The Woman Question).
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