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Rodney College Year 13 student Michael Lynch had a brush with fame earlier this month when he sat in on a weekend rehearsal for the play Taking Off, written by Sir Roger Hall.
Michael hopes to take a step into professional drama next year, through an apprenticeship with a theatre company.
Knowing of his plans, college drama teacher Lucy Duffield leaned on a friend, who is the production and stage manager for Tadpole Productions, to give Michael a chance to observe a real-life rehearsal.
This led to a hall in Mt Roskill, where director Simon Prast and the cast of Taking Off were busy preparing for the show that ran at The Pumphouse from September 5 to 15.
Unbeknown to Michael, Hall, one of NZ’s most successful playwrights, dropped in on the rehearsal.
“I watched him making notes about the play and it was amazing to think that this was the man who actually wrote the play, sitting there watching it,” Michael said.
“It was a really valuable experience to see how a director works, the decisions he makes and how his confidence reflects on the cast. You can see him cutting everything into his vision of how he wants the play to be performed.
“It was also a much calmer experience than anything I’ve been involved in here at the college.”
During his years at Rodney, Michael has performed in Devil in Drag, Dracula and took the lead role of Jack in this year’s production, Jack Absolute Flies Again.
He says directing appeals to him because he loves the idea of storytelling and putting all the pieces together.
“In the case of a stage production, it’s not just the play itself, but the lighting, sound, props and so on. It’s a bit like Lego – you put all the blocks together to make something great.”
Two other Year 13 students – Ethan Skelling and Benny Manson – were also given the opportunity to visit the set during production rehearsals at The Pumphouse in the week before the show opened.
