PROJECT REPORT:
RSC LEARNING - PLAYBACK 2006

The RSC Learning Playback project is an example of a targeted schools’ project where the Theatre Royal’s Education & Community Department work in partnership with a visiting company to bring their education work to the region.

This project is designed for Year 10 students and their teachers and forms the main focus of RSC Learning’s work with schools at Key Stage 4.

Playback aims to give students the opportunity to explore their creativity through a performance project and to develop their drama skills.

It also seeks to help them investigate the relationship between some of the ideas in Shakespeare’s plays and their own interests and experiences.

The students are asked to create a short devised performance piece in response to Romeo and Juliet.

In 2006 the Playback project took place with six participating schools from Newcastle, Gateshead and North Tyneside:

The project included the following input from RSC Learning and the Theatre Royal Education & Community Department:

Playback culminated in a Performance Day at the Theatre Royal where the six schools performed their work on the set of Romeo & Juliet.

In the evening, all the participants stayed to see the RSC performance of Romeo & Juliet at the Theatre Royal.

As part of Playback 2006, we asked the students some questions before and after the project, to see if their perceptions of Shakespeare and his plays had changed as a result of their involvement in this work. Here are a few of their comments:

After the project:
• I do now think that Shakespeare shouldn’t be studied, it should be performed.
• I thought it was boring, until we started acting it.
• At first I thought it was going to be boring, but when you learn the stories, they are cool!
• It’s fun to do. It’s not just a bunch of old English!
• Now I totally understand it…
• Romeo & Juliet was SO fun to do…I never thought it would be this good.

The Theatre Royal will continue to develop their relationship with RSC Learning in the future, working in partnership to help facilitate and deliver aspects of their work here in North East.

For more information on RSC Learning go to www.rsc.org.uk/learning