School play....why do auditions???

[Schoolmum2468]

It's school play season AGAIN...and again the same old story happening again. (3x DC...always the same story)

I told DH weeks ago when we found out the play who would be given which parts. And low and behold....I was correct.

And my DC has come home in tears because they weren't given any of the parts they auditioned for. Even the extra part the teacher asked them to audition for

The child who told mine not to bother going for part A because it was their part...yup got the part

The pushy parents child got the main part (AGAIN!!!)

"Shy" children who have now come out of their shells now they're the eldest in the school.... literally background scenery.

My DC's friend is also upset because they wanted a speaking part and got 1 short line "no way" type of thing

My DC wanted an acting part and got narrator (again). They've been told in the past that it's because they're a good reader....but now in yr6 after years of being narrator (both in end of year plays and Xmas nativities) they thought for the last play in primary they would try really hard to get an acting part.

So what is the point of asking children which part they want and going through auditions if teachers are going to ignore all that and just chose who they want.

And why not give other children a little bit of a chance in the spotlight if they want it. Chances are the shyer ones are going to be even more lost in secondary and this may be their last chance. It's a school play....why not add lines for children who want them. It's primary school not a theatre production!!!

If any teachers can explain why they do this year upon year....please enlighten me.

Every person on stage has an important part to play. The major roles are given to the pupils best suited for each role.

Mary and Joseph are not major roles, never have been and never will be, so can we skip past any posts about Mary and Joseph please?

Schools choose those who are able to deliver their lines confidently.

Some children can’t wait to take part in school concerts. Other children shy away. Not all schools will force confident children to be involved in school events, for good reason. Xx

Like I said immediately before the part of my post you quoted - it was even the same paragraph - It's lovely to hear about all the meritocracies and all the schools where teachers get kids with no prejudices about what those kids are like. I hope we hit one of those in secondary.

Auditions, for a start, would be a game changer at ours.

I just can't believe that our school is that unusual. Obviously I only know what happens in my year group and the auditions are probably done differently in younger years, but I'm sure colleagues in those years don't give parts to children based on who their parents are etc.

Teachers just can't win, can they?

If they dished out the parts without auditions, then parents would complain that the parts are always given to the same children because of favouritism, pushy parents etc.

If they do auditions and try to get an idea about what types of part each child would ideally want, then the parents complain that there was no point in doing auditions because their child didn't get the part that they auditioned for.

It's ridiculous. An audition is just that..an audition to see who is best suited to the part. The part will be given to the children who are the best for it. Surely parents help their children to understand this before they go into it, and do their best to manage their children's expectations appropriately?

Some kids happen good at drama, singing, dancing or whatever. Just like some kids are good at sport. The ones who shine will get picked for parts whether their parents are pushy or not, just as the sporty ones will be given a spot on the team. Your job as a parent is to help your child develop resilience in response to these little disappointments, and to encourage them to work on their skills and try again next time if that's what they would like to do.

Also we don't ask specifically which part they would like - just main, smaller, a few words, backstage etc. The auditions are more like a drama activity; the children are asked to get into groups and given a choice of scenes to practice and then they all perform to the rest of the year group. Even though some of the characters in the scene have more lines, we often choose someone who only says a couple of lines for a bigger part because they perform well.

Do we really have people on here thinking that an audition for a part means that you will automatically get that part?

I don't think it's based on who their parents are at ours, mostly, though I'm sure the behaviour of parents plays a role as does the behaviour of children - that's certainly the perception of both my kids. That my kids have that perception - at very different ages - is a problem in itself, don't you think? They haven't got it from home, they've formed these views themselves.

I think they have very strong preconceptions of children and aren't terribly open to children changing significantly over the course of seven years. And I can understand them giving things to children who are more likely to make a fuss rather than to those who will just quietly get on with it despite the disappointment so that the teachers may not even know that they're disappointed at all.

Do we really have people on here thinking that auditions are not merely formalities and in many cases the teachers have not already decided that the main parts will be going to the same children who’ve been playing the lead parts for the last five years?

It's quite pervasive in our school, really. Right down to them not being able to get their heads around my son's bully not being 'a lovely boy, I'm sure he meant no harm' after an ongoing campaign of very nasty behaviour that my own kid didn't tell me about (he's the 'don't make a fuss' one) but I had three separate parents call me about it because their kids were so upset at what was being done to my child.

Six months later, the bully was made house captain.

Like I said, I'm sure there are lovely, meritocratic schools out there. Ours is good in many ways but they cannot be budged from their idea of who children are, and who should be doing what things. It's deeply culturally ingrained.

Apparently so.... and if they don't get that part, they wonder what the point of the auditions was.

Kids are invited to audition so that teachers can see what they are able to do. In other words, so that they don't base their casting decisions on preconceived ideas about which kids would fit which parts.

Ultimately, though, the other kids get to audition as well, and perhaps they showed themselves to be more suitable for the part that your dc wanted. That's just the way it goes sometimes.

And yes, perhaps it was predictable that certain dc would get a main part. Perhaps tat is because they are good at acting and always do well in the auditions etc. A bit like some kids will always get picked for the sports teams because they happen to be good at sport.

GD auditioned and has the role of Lumiere in Beauty and the Beast but a) she recently gave a memorised speech to a hall full of people so they know she won’t get stage fright and b) they change the cast at the interval so she will be in the chorus for the second half. To her credit, she has spent the holiday learning her lines and her big song ‘Be our Guest’. It’s hard when you are not chosen and want to be. I was good at tennis but the PE teacher only saw me as the girl who couldn’t play netball so I was never in the tennis team.

At my sons school they actually brought in an outside company to produce the final play and while the usual suspects got some of the main parts some of the others did get parts too. It's hard to give 60 kids a proper part though.

Well, I hope you're all OK with the likely upshot of threads like this, which is that more and more teachers will just say, "fuck it" and not bother doing plays at all.
They're a massive workload for little to no thanks or appreciation; in fact, more than that, teachers themselves are specifically opened up to nasty accusations of favouritism and almost bullying behaviour.
Why on earth should any of us sign up for that.

Why would they say ‘fuck it’? Why wouldn’t they say ‘some really good ideas on here on how we can approach it differently’?

Because in my (extensive) school experience, teachers don't do all the things accused of here.
And we have to look at the bigger picture of dealing with dozens of children, all with the same hopes and aspirations. Most parents on here are only looking at it from the point of view of their own child.
You have no idea of the number of complaints schools get about (relatively) minor nonsense.

Well, I hope you're all OK with the likely upshot of threads like this, which is that more and more teachers will just say, "fuck it" and not bother doing plays at all. No more school plays would actually be wonderful, I'd welcome this.

I will say though that being ignored by teachers at primary school can actually be a life lesson. Imo the kids who were the primary school super stars have a more difficult time adjusting when they arrive at secondary as they are suddenly a small fish in big water competing for special recognition with 200 other children rather than a few dozen. They have to be able to build rapport with a large number of teachers rather than relying on their established reputation at primary.

I think they have very strong preconceptions of children and aren't terribly open to children changing significantly over the course of seven years. And I can understand them giving things to children who are more likely to make a fuss rather than to those who will just quietly get on with it despite the disappointment so that the teachers may not even know that they're disappointed at all. This! However, those quieter children can come into their own at secondary and beyond and if supported well by parents at home these will be the children with bags of resilience and grit.

I remember when my children were at primary school and this all sounds very familiar. I always used to say that my children made very good trees while the same children got the main parts again and again. Some of the stars deserved it as they were very good at it but there were several who were very wooden yet got chosen time and again. My son was not bothered but my daughter would have liked just once to have been chosen. When she was in year six she auditioned but the person in charge was the new deputy head, who had obvious favourites and my daughter was not one of them. I think she was given one line. When it came to the performance, though, I was relieved as the whole thing was an absolute embarrassment. It was under rehearsed, many children forgot their lines and the “acting” from all but one child suggested that they would have made better trees. Fortunately, secondary schools tend to be more democratic. All those saying that not being chosen is a good life lesson to learn, were you and/or your children always the stars of the primary school play?

I’m afraid some do - three DC through primary school, so 21 years worth of primary teachers and it certainly did happen. I witnessed it as a parent and it was my experience at school too. The same pupils, year after year, for the same lead parts.

I’m also well aware of the nature of complaints - friends and family members were/are teachers.

My dd is one of the kids who was always picked for the good parts - it happened in at each of the three schools she attended. I am always annoyed by the suggestion that it was because I was a "pushy parent" or whatever, because honestly, nothing could be further from the truth. I even held off from volunteering as a school governor etc until after she had left her primary school because of all the nonsense that you read on MN etc - I wanted there to be no doubt that she was getting stuff on her own merit.

I do get that it's annoying if your dc is never picked, but there is no need to suggest that the kids that do get the roles are somehow being pushed forward more than they deserve by over ambitious parents. It just makes you sound petty and jealous.

Petty and jealous is kind of a target demographic for large swathes of MN though, isn't it? Just let them vent. Won't make their kids any better at acting, but at least it gives their teachers a break ...

Whether Mary and Joseph are big parts or not would depend on the play and script.

Ha, maybe!It just annoys me to see so much resentment towards kids like my dc, who can't actually help the fact that they get picked for stuff. Also, at secondary school, dd used to spend hours behind the scenes helping the younger kids learn and rehearse their parts, often working on scenes/numbers that had nothing to do with her character. Most of their parents wouldn't have a clue how much effort she used to invest in their dc, helping them to perform to the best of their ability on stage. It isn't always just about entitled kids expecting to swan in and take all of the best roles without putting the effort in...of course, talent/aptitude is important, but work ethic and being a team player will often factor into the casting decisions as well.

And yet we still don't have anyone explain why it's OK for the PE teacher to pick those kids who can, you know, reliably kick or catch a ball for the football/netball league teams?
But the drama teacher has to make it fair and put shy kids or those with no stage presence or ability to learn words or hold a tune into lead roles on stage?

The league things are very different - they aren’t compulsory and they don’t involve every pupil so parents of everyone in the class doesn’t have to watch. The equivalent analogy would be to say that teachers get to pick who takes part in the schools sports day races - and everyone else has to stand and clap them, or serve the squash and crisps, or blow the whistle or whatever, but not actually take part in the main event, ever.

No-one is asking the teacher to put the shy child with no stage presence on stage but mixing up who gets the the lead parts each year is a start - and pp have already explained how other schools have done things differently and approached it more fairly. It can be done.

But sports days are full of parents clapping the kids who are good at sport. Everyone gets to take part, but the medals and trophies are given to the children who perform best. I don't really see why it's any different tbh. It's just that the decision about who performs best has to be taken at an earlier stage for drama so that the kids can learn their parts and practise.

Unless your school does sports days that are completely non-competitive, it's actually very similar in my view. Assuming, that is, that all children have at least some kind of role in the drama, even if it is only as part of the ensemble.