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Mid Powys Youth TheatreThe Drama CentreTremont Road Llandrindod Powys LD1 5EB |
| phone | 01597 824444 |
| contact person | Sue Early, MPYT Co-ordinator |
| artistic policy | Weekly workshops for young people aged 14 to 24 are held every Tuesday at Powys Dance Centre. Please phone 01597 824444 for further details |
| other notes | Socially, MPYT’s work aims to: Encourage co-operation amongst young people through enjoyable creative activity. Develop commitment and a recognition of individual and social responsibility. Enhance social skills and the ability of young people to communicate thoughtfully and openly amongst themselves and within their community. Creatively, MPYT seeks to: Offer opportunities for young people to explore, develop and express their understanding of the world in which they live through participation in weekly workshops and theatre performances. Develop young people's practical skills in the area of theatre making that gives them the greatest challenge and excitement. Explore the fullest possible range of theatre theory and practice from around the world. Develop a life long love and use of theatre and the arts as life enhancing. Entertain their community with theatre which is relevant and significant. Background The Mid Powys Youth Theatre (MPYT) was founded in 1987 as part of Theatr Powys' community theatre policy. Since being founded MPYT has had 15 incredibly successful years which has seen MPYT appear twice at the Royal National Theatre, win consecutive Youth Work in Wales Excellence Awards, A Barclays' Youth Action Award, The BBC Arts Award for 'Welsh Theatre Company of the Year' and a Health Promotion Wales Award for making 'An outstanding contribution to the lives of young people in Wales'. In fact MPYT have won an award for every year of their existence, making them one of the outstanding Youth Theatres of Britain and all the more remarkable because they come from a rural area. MPYT produce an annual show at the Wyeside Arts Centre, Builth Wells, where the entire company of approximately sixty young people (aged 14 - 24 years old) come together. The shows have become a local tradition and an important part of the Welsh Cultural year. These shows are at their best when devised with the company, in fact MPYT have an enviable reputation for developing challenging and entertaining work on a grand scale. This is in part due to the way in which we work. MPYT is essentially a collaboration between young people and professional theatre workers, allowing young people to develop their ideas in all aspects of production from costume design to music, from choreography to lighting. MPYT attempt to produce other shows on a smaller scale throughout the year and these have included a video production, collaborations with dance companies, tours, cabarets and fund raising dance which mix performance with dance music. In addition weekly workshops are held which attempt to give a wide range of skills from circus to improvisation. Our award winning summer school has now developed into another regular performance slot. This allows ex and older members to take part in an intensive rehearsal period to produce a show for the town's Victorian Festival Week. Despite our rural location, in no sense can MPYT's work be described as parochial. Past productions include a play about Mexican painters Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, Russian composer Shostakovich and poetess Anna Akhmatova, an original fairy story, a play looking at youth culture in the light of drug and alcohol accessibility, and our latest production; a contemporary version of Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors. "Everything theatre should be: passionate, funny, sexy, musical and something significant" Richard Eyre (Artistic Director Royal National Theatre) about 'Frida and Diego' |
