By Joanne Dorr
The Haldimand Press
CALEDONIA—Last week students from eight high schools throughout southwestern Ontario gathered at Caledonia’s Riverside Exhibition Hall to participate in the National Theatre School’s Dramafest (NTSD).
NTSD started in 1946 pursuing their mission to make theatre more accessible to all Canadian youth. NTSD has since grown, hosting 10,000 students annually in some Atlantic provinces, Alberta, and Ontario. Haldimand has its home in Ontario’s NTSD district of Brant, Oxford, Haldimand, Norfolk.
NTSD brings together students, teachers, artists, and parents. Their goal is to create a safe, nurturing, and creative space for high school drama students to showcase their work. NTSD is a platform dedicated to the practice of theater crafts and is designed to stimulate teamwork, problem solving, and empathy.
NTSD takes place over three days. Prior to the festival, participating schools choose an existing play or write one of their own. They stage, rehearse, and present the play during the festival to an audience. The production is completely run by students who own all aspects of the production.
The host school also has added responsibilities, which this year came to McKinnon Park Secondary School in Caledonia. Tanya Lacey, a McKinnon Park teacher supporting the host students, proudly shares, “(The students) know what they have to do. They are in there making signs for the audience, they’re putting out the chairs. They are taking total ownership.” Lacey says by the end of the festival the kids are running everything.
Keira Lynas, a teacher from Brantford Collegiate Institute (BCI), says students walk away from the festival having learned a lot about confidence and leadership and often sees students participate every year. Lynas reveals, “You know it’s impactful when they decide to do a victory lap just because they want to do NTS again!”
Jan St. Denis, a teacher at BCI, points out, “Students learn a lot of skills from teachers and from each other. There are so many different parts of putting on a stage production, they can really specialize in something specific. We also have a lot of kids who are much more generalist and do the production, the costumes, the onstage work, and the acting. It depends on what the kids want to get out of it.”
After the final performance, adjudicators determine the district winners. District finalists are then invited to one of six Ontario Regional Festivals and from there, two productions from each regional festival are invited to perform at the Ontario showcase. This year’s Outstanding Productions were The Other Room by Cayuga Secondary School (CSS) and Dear High School by Waterford District High School (WDHS).
In addition to district winners, adjudicators also give out various awards. This year Jason Mayo of Waterford proudly sponsored the 2023 best new actor award, which has been named the “Keck Award” in honour of Donna McEachran, a former CSS drama teacher, and her legacy of advancing the performing arts throughout Haldimand and beyond. The award, handed out by Donna’s brother Mark, was given to Brady Locke for his portrayal of Todd in WDHS’ musical production of Dear High School.
Mitchell Regan of Hagersville Secondary School took home a Distinctive Merit award for Acting as the character Ben in Imperfect Proposal, and MPSS student Lily Chomej won the same award for Fantastic Improv playing Meyer in The Baloney, The Pickle, The Zomie, and Other Things I Hide From My Mother. CSS also took home two Excellence awards: Acting for Andrew Yager as Austin in The Other Room and Original Music by Marcus Hoecht for The Other Room.
For more information, visit ent-nts.ca.
