Product Description

You Made Me is a powerful but sensitive playcript for schools, focused on the issue of divorce. It is accompanied by supporting resource material, which includes background information and stimulating activities. Playscript -- the book contains a playscript focusing on issues that are of interest in schools. Accompanying resources contain activities for drama (including role-play), reading, writing, and speaking and listening. These are accompanied by extension material, including extracts from modern and pre-20th-century works for comparison, and documentary material. The resources are organised under the following headings: * Staging the play * Work on and around the script * Themes in and around the play * Media.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1618095 in Books
• Published on: 2000-03-20
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 96 pages

Review
'You Made Me works very well... because it speaks clearly to the cast... It also costs very little to perform. It needs no set and costumes are simple.' The Stage

Customer Reviews

well handled if a little short
I and my Year 10 Drama class at school put on a performance of You Made Me as part of our coursework. Although the book itself looks quite long, the playscript only takes up about half of it, as the rest is given over to writing activities, discussion points and other teaching aids. This meant that the perfromance takes less than an hour. There are plenty of characters, from those with long monologues and who appear in every scene, to parents or teachers who are only in a couple, so generally good for a group of varying ability oor confidence. I particularly liked the character of Alan, who talkes refuge insode his head as 'Commander Alan Snow' and is plagued by a voice in his head and thoughts of madness. Other scenes are a little predictable ( after an argument over her mum's new boyfriend, and 'there has to be some time for me in all this', one girl has an emotional reunion and everything's lovely).
From reading the play, I got the feeling that the authors would rather it was a film or tv adaptation, having included impossible stage directions (the ceiling and walls move away)and things like 'the sun shines through the window'.
But many scenes are good - sibling rivalry is authentic and there are imaginative uses of group/chorus work and suggestions for dance interpretation etc. I was a little concerned that people who had experienced divorce and fighting would find it preachy, but they seemed to just see it as a play, perhaps taking it less seriously than they would if it was on a soap etc.
Good for Drama lessons, but perhaps using two short plays with an interval between them would be a good format for a performance.