Under the direction of Jen Summers, with production support from costume design leader Joan Saunders and tech crew leader Starr Fair, this winter’s performance of She Kills Monsters is set to hit the stage with an open dress rehearsal Thursday evening before opening to the public on Friday and Saturday evenings at 7:00 PM in the Wilkins Meeting House.
On a quiet Sunday afternoon, filled with final exam preparations, we reflect on the past two days and all that transpired within our remarkable little community. Starting on Friday morning with the arrival of our Board of Trustees on campus for the first time in two years, we enjoyed a 48 hour sprint that included our final Fall Term classes, a Holderness Day pep rally in assembly, Fall Term Art Show, Dance and Jazz/Rock Ensemble performances, and a full day of competitions for Holderness Day 2021.
When our students step into the studio, the wood shop, the forge, or on the stage, they shed the invisible weight of the world around them and immerse themselves in the identity-forming process of creating art.
The final days of the Spring Term consistently showcase the best of Proctor in action: creativity, art, music, pursuit of individual passions, and an appreciation for the work of others. Wednesday afternoon brought the entire community together one last time for Proctor’s Art Department Express Fest, Senior Project presentations, and AP Language Moth talks. It was a jam-packed day reminding us of just how fun it is to see our students’ learning in action.
Thirty days. After bouncing in and out of quarantine and waiting for a full cast and crew to finally be available, Proctor’s Drama Department had less than thirty days to rehearse for this spring’s production of Mamma Mia!. But if you have the opportunity to watch the production live during the next four nights, odds are you would never know how compressed a rehearsal schedule this group navigated. The show is energetic, spunky, loud, funny, and clever, and as is always the case with Proctor’s theater productions, a reminder of how talented our students and faculty are.
For Proctor’s drama department, it has been exactly one year since students last took the stage. With the annual spring musical canceled due to Covid-19 last spring, director Jen Summers is thrilled her company will produce Peter and the Star Catcher this week for the community. An extended production run over four nights this week has provided the cast and crew the invaluable feedback of a live audience, something every performer and lover of the performing arts has missed over the past year.
In a term that bridged remote learning, on-campus quarantine, and in-person instruction, Proctor’s Arts Department has shown the entire community what perseverance looks like. On Friday evening, the Dance Team and Jazz/Rock Ensemble shared their talents with the community in back-to-back performances, and while rehearsal time was roughly half of what it would have been during a “normal” term, the students shone as brightly as the full moon over campus this weekend.
It’s one of the corners of the school where history is visible, where narrative takes concrete form. It’s behind the thick curtains of the stage, behind a wall with a huge clattering garage door, behind the mystery darkness of the back stage. Penetrate far enough and you step into the scene shop, where the power tools are racked, the trays of screws and lag bolts stack up, the paint brushes and rollers hang over an industrial sink. Pry bars, levels, caulking guns, miter saw, plywood, doorknobs, castors, tape measures, battery chargers, clamps, step ladders surround the visitor. It’s a bright, busy space. It smells of sawdust and paint and dreams.
