By the time everyone reads this it will be long past the time to wish you a Happy New Year, but in a sense that’s what I’d like to do, because this is the new year for CastawaysDrama.

 

Perhaps “new season” would be more appropriate because, now that the excitement of “The Alternative Snow White”, Christmas and the dawn of 2015 are past, we turn our thoughts to what happens next.

 

Before I do, however, can I pay a small tribute to our founder, Jackie, who was the one who came up with the idea for the group in the first place! We all have ideas from time to time (“wouldn’t it be great if we could...”). Well Jackie did - and then did something about it - and here we all.

Being Chairman (I suppose I should say “President” as we are in France) isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and Jackie bravely took on the job while we formed the group and got going, but I think it’s no secret that Jackie prefers to be on stage, and that’s where we’ll look forward to seeing her in the not too distant future.

Back to today and plans for this year.

 

Your new committee is full of ideas as to how to turn us into a drama group to be noticed while having a lot of fun which, after all, is what acting and theatre is all about.

 

Starting in March, we will be holding a series of workshops covering all aspects of theatre and stagecraft. We will be led by professionals and ex-professionals (yes, I know, some of us are retired!) who have many years experience in both amateur and professional theatre, both on and off stage.

 

Acting, lighting, set design, production management, in fact any of the many stage disciplines. If you’re an old hand and want to get involved again, or if you’ve never done anything like it before, then come and join us.

 

This is intended not only to be a practical series of workshops but, we hope, social occasions as well, where we can meet up, chat, have the odd drink and form ourselves into that delightful crowd that is theatre.

 

So come along, invite your friends and join the party!

 

This newsletter should arrive on members' electronic doorstep quarterly, so in between times I would urge you to keep visiting our website where we hope to keep you updated with all the latest events, play readings and – yes – shows.

 

You can’t have a drama group without a show and plans are advancing to mount not one but possibly three shows over the next year. A tall order? Yes, possibly, but they’re not all smash hit pantos with a cast of thousands! And all I would say at this stage is “watch this space”. It promises to be an exciting year!

 

Tim