Please enjoy a short recount from Year 9 students Rylee Lamp-Brooks and Bella Redic who recently participated in a workshop with Commedia dell'Arte expert Andrew Crupi.

On Monday 27 February, we got to enjoy ‘A Solo Commedia dell’Arte Show’ by Andrew Crupi. The show went for 50 minutes. Mr Crupi entertained the Year 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 Drama students, using different voices and physicality to play seven different characters. He also made funny jokes that we all had a good laugh at. Mr Crupi was accompanied by musician Jake Morrison. Mr Crupi got different characters to talk to each other while having one mask in his hand and the other mask on his face. He even played three characters at once, which showed us how skilful and amazing he was as a performer.

After the show, we had time to ask questions. He told us that we need to adapt to whatever place or space is available to us to practise. He sometimes had to practise in his dining room! Afterwards, the Year 9 Drama girls came back and did a workshop with Mr Crupi. We learned about the four key aspects of Commedia, which are masks, languages, stock characters and improvisation as a means of creation. We got to learn about how the different characters walk. We started off with the Zani and ended with the Captains. Learning about these characters took us two lessons and the time flew by. We looked really silly doing all the characters, especially the Zani.

Mr Crupi showed us the importance of staying in character and that even though we might be wearing a mask on our face, our whole body needs to wear the mask to be in character. This experience was so fun to enjoy. Thank you, Mr Crupi, for this amazing experience. The Year 9s were glad to have the experience of walking and talking in our characters, and all the different year levels were very lucky to have experienced a live Commedia performance.