DANCE AND DRAMATRIX CLUB
DANCE
During the months of July and August, distinguished choreographer Lillian Mendes of Dance Planet, and ex-Andrean, came to conduct a dance workshop at St.Andrew’s. Besides being part of Nache Baliye and Jhalak Dikhla Ja (partnering Mohinder Amarnath !)and staging many a musical, she did make time for our enthusiastic Andreans and showed up promptly, music in hand, at 11.30 am in the morning, post regular lectures. Most of the students, who weren't exactly professionals on the dance floor, looked forward to the sessions with a bit of trepidation but Lillian did a great job getting them into the groove with a variety of steps. She taught the students self-expression, and how dance could help them with poise and confidence. It was also a great form of exercise and a healthy way of 'staying fit'. Students, from both junior and senior college, would even stay over-time in order to participate. Before long, every one was looking forward to attend the thrice- weekly lessons.
The course especially touched upon Jive, Salsa and other popular forms of free dancing. Soon enough, the ‘J Los’ and ‘Michael Jacksons’ from the group were even dancing on stage for the various college cultural events.
All in all, it was a fantastic opportunity for Andreans to perfect their skills and moves, while also gaining the confidence to get onto a performer’s platform. We look forward to keeping the students enthusiasm high with continued workshops in dance as a form of creative expression, in the coming academic year.
DRAMA
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In the month of January, Annabelle Ferro, a well known name in local theatre conducted Drama workshops with a group of students, keen on a first time exposure to acting. Using Role Playing, the participants were asked to stage various scenarios and brought to the fore some exceptional talent amongst our Dramatrix members. She took the students through Drama exercises in impromptu acting ,ad libbing and improvising characters as they would have to do on a performing platform.
Later in the month, Leandro D’silva, Actor and Corporate Consultant in Communications, engaged the Drama Club members in some very interesting and entertaining exercises. Using the Laban School of Communications and Movement technique, the students worked on Body Movement, Posture, Attitude and Action while performing given skits.
These workshops were a great initiation to ‘On -Stage Performances’ which St Andrew's College with its various cultural events, offers to many a student.
Prof-in-charge
Prof. Desiree Gonsalves
OLIO ‘11
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St. Andrews College, Bandra is proud to present OLIO 2011, The Intercollegiate Drama competition on September 7th and 10th at St Andrews Auditorium. The only English theatre competition of its kind, OLIO showcases 4 finalist plays of half hour each, selected after rounds of elimination. OLIO works with the aim of scouting fresh talent at the college level and thus gives aspiring actors and directors, a platform to perform on. Moreover, we encourage the participants to write their own screenplays thus giving aspiring writers a chance to showcase their talent. The finals see the best on stage, in an entertaining show interspersed with ‘fillers’ (which do get the audience cracking up!), trophies and prizes,(ranging from the Best Actor /Director/Scriptwriter to Sets/Lights and Sound) including fun prizes for the audience too. Being judged by celebrities helps makes this competition an absolute crowd puller. In the past few years, we’ve had Genelia, Perizad Zorabian, Cyrus Broacha, Nikhil Chinappa, Dolly Thakore, Rael Padamsee, Sharon Prabakhar, Milind Soman add a touch of glamour to the event. There’s a theme to every show, which has ranged from Mumbai Masala, Masquerade, Demons and Angels, Colors of Emotions and this year it’s “Laughter is the best Medicine”, since we all know that comedy never fails to please! Over the past decade, we have had colleges from all over Mumbai participating in OLIO. Last year we hade 14 colleges participating in the event. And our final 4 colleges were St. Andrew’s College, St. Xavier’s College, Wilsons College, and Hinduja College. We’ve even had Frieda Pinto of St Xavier’s College win our ‘Best Actress’ trophy in 2004 apart from our one time “Best Actors”, Anand Tiwari and Pierre Timmins who are now in Bollywood. In our 11th year of the competition, we intend to get even bigger and better. For starters, we plan to have a second showing of the finals open to the general public. We do believe this is the ideal stage (St. Andrew’s very professional auditorium, does provide that) for talent at the college level to be recognized…So do come and be a part of all the …Lights, Cameras, Action………………..OLIO 2011!!