Plays designed for CSEC delight general audiences

Two short plays designed to help students prepare for Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) exams were so successful when staged in March that they were remounted last month for general audiences. The second staging proved even more successful than the first.

When The Gleaner attended the final showing at the Little Little Theatre last Sunday, a dozen or so of audience members were sitting in the aisle. Needless to say, Akeem Mignott, the writer-producer of the plays, and the director of one, was delighted at this reception for the début production of his group, Trapix Theatre Ensemble.

“Trapix was birthed out of the global COVID pandemic,” Mignott explained to me. Then he added, “—and my frustration”.

The frustration came about because in 2020, when Mignott came back to Jamaica, fresh from obtaining a master’s degree in applied theatre at Goldsmith University of London, the country was in lockdown mode because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, the theatres were dark at a time when he was looking forward to making use of the knowledge and skills he had gained from his studies, and experience of London theatre.

Though he had returned to his previous drama teaching job at Hillel Academy, Mignott, a compulsive multitasker — “I can’t help myself,” he admitted – is of the view that drama teachers should also be theatre practitioners. This, he said, would enable students to be sure that the theory they were getting had practical applications.

So he wanted to get back to working in theatre, his first love. The passion for it had developed long before he even started on his bachelor’s in drama in education programme at the Edna Manley College’s School of Drama. Even after graduating, he had reservations about going into teaching. Now, however, he affirmed during the interview, he had equal love for teaching and practising theatre.

He conceptualised a speech and drama project and reached out to fellow drama teachers for students. The 15 he got, he offered a free workshop at Stella Maris church hall.

The two groups into which he divided the students, one set of eight to 11-year-olds and the other of 12 to 25-year-olds, were seen on separate days. They were trained by specialists in theatre and allied arts whom Mignott brought in to assist him.

The workshops went well. So did the end-of-term online show of mainly poems and dub pieces that the group produced to showcase what they had learnt. At the end of the project, Mignott was loath to abandon the group of passionate, talented, trained performers, so he incorporated some of them – along with others he auditioned – into Trapix Theatre Ensemble and continued the training.

In May this year, as government restrictions were gradually eased and entertainment started coming back, Mignott got the idea for a stage production. He “dusted off” a couple of short plays he had written long before, rewrote them with CSEC students in mind, and started rehearsals in a church hall on Belmont Road.

The four shows were staged over two weekends and went very well, so well that, after they closed, Mignott said, he got “a slew” of requests for repeat showings. Of course, the Trapix company was delighted to oblige and the shows were remounted at Little Little Theatre.

The production is of a variety called ‘roots’ in Jamaica, and ‘farce’ internationally – the latter term being Mignott’s preference. It has a minimalist set, simple plot, comic tone, fast pace, and one-dimensional characters.

Responding to my surprise that he, an experienced, highly educated theatre practitioner, would make his first production a farce, Mignott said it was a deliberate choice. He wanted a show that would attract a school audience, and would have themes and characters the students could analyse for exam purposes.

The first play, Nyah’s House of Zion, is about the reaction of residents in an upper-class community, Norbrook, to having a Rasta couple – with their Rasta dress and loud ritual drumming – coming to live in their midst. This play is character-driven, while the second, The Letter, is a plot-driven, suspense-filled tale about whether a boss will find a letter cursing him for his ingratitude which an employee accidentally puts in an envelope destined for the boss’ desk.

Though the production is behind them, the group continues to meet and train every Saturday, Mignott said. Come January, he will again have auditions for anyone wishing to join the ensemble.

Meanwhile, true to his multitasking nature, Mignott also continues to teach full-time at Hillel Academy and part-time at the Edna Manley School of Drama. In addition, he rehearses four times a week with nearly 40 members of the Jamaica Junior Theatre for a remount of Nesta’s Rock, a musical about the life of young Bob Marley.

Originally written by Samantha Chin Yee and Jodi HoLung, it has been rewritten by Mignott and is scheduled for a late January 2023 opening at the Philip Sherlock Centre for the Creative Arts at The University of the West Indies, Mona campus.

entertainment@gleanerjm.com