this month's
Ink Pellet contains
Punching Hard
Artistic director of Nottingham Playhouse, Adam Penford, 45, talks to Susan Elkin especially about Punch which opened at Apollo Theatre London this month and simultaneously on Broadway. “Yes” chuckles Adam, who is talking to me via Zoom from New York, where he is in rehearsals. “It is very unusual for a new play to open […]
First Encounters: King Lear
Once more taking Shakespeare to schools and communities around the country, Susan Elkin caught up with the RSC in Birmingham for an inspiring afternoon. “But nothing will come of nothing” called an irrepressible, totally engaged girl of about nine in response to Oliver Senton as a fine King Lear gasping his incredulous “Nothing?” in the […]
Prize Writer
Chris Power, 50, is a novelist, reviewer, teacher and judge for the 2025 Booker Prize. Susan Elkin spoke to him. Chris Power is on holiday in Sweden when I catch up with him. “Yes,” he says cheerfully. “This is the lakeside house that my Swedish wife grew up in and we’re here on holiday with […]
ROYAL COURT YOUNG PLAYWRIGHTS AWARD
The 2026 Young Playwrights Award is now officially nation-wide! Do you have an idea or a story to tell? Can you imagine it performed live, by actors on a stage? It’s time to start your playwriting journey. The Young Playwrights Award is a free, open-access competition for any teenager in the UK interested in writing a play, […]
VOICED: THE FESTIVAL FOR ENDANGERED LANGUAGES
With half of the world’s languages threatened to fall silent by the end of the century comes the first ever UK festival Voiced: The Festival for Endangered Languages, celebrating the power of language and art by highlighting endangered global and local languages through a creative festival. Throughout October, the Barbican, London will be filled with an explosion of voices and […]
NATIONAL THEATRE EXPANDS SCHOOLS PROGRAMME
The National Theatre has announced its autumn programme for schools across the UK, deepening its work with young people to support its continued ambition to reach every child in the UK before they leave school. Over 90% of state secondary schools are already signed up to access the National Theatre Collection to stream world-leading theatre directly […]
The National Plan for Drama and Theatre Education
Following feedback from drama teachers, educators and other interested parties, The National Plan for Drama and Theatre Education document is now completed and you can find a direct link to the pdf here. This is a mammoth achievement and a feat of collaboration. It has been widely circulated including to the DfE Team, whose members are also […]
BROADWAY LICENSING GLOBAL OFFERS UK TEACHERS FREE PERUSALS FOR HARRY POTTER AND THE CURSED CHILD SECONDARY SCHOOL EDITION
The Critically Acclaimed Show Has Now Been Adapted for UK Secondary Schools (London)—Broadway Licensing Global London, Sonia Friedman Productions, Colin Callender and Harry Potter Theatrical Productions are thrilled to announce that secondary school teachers can now sign up for a free perusal script of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Secondary School Edition. BLG London […]
A Final Haunt
After 33 extraordinary years, Susan Hill’s The Woman in Black will haunt the stage of the Fortune Theatre for the final time, as the production ends in the West End on Saturday 4th March 2023. PW Productions announce that after 33 extraordinary years in London’s West End, the theatrical sensation that is Susan Hill’s THE […]
Reaching for the Moon
Susan Elkin paid a visit to Half Moon theatre in London’s East End to chat with CEO Chris Elwell about their extensive education outreach and innovative theatre programmes. Half Moon Theatre sits in the heart of Limehouse in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, spitting distance from the DLR and mainline station. Formerly a pretty […]
Library
Ink Pellet’s book review section covers an eclectic selection of new fiction, teachers’ guides, audio books and classics.
Many of our reviews are written by teachers, so we have an expert eye on how texts will work in the classroom. We hope to create a useful archive of reviews so that you can use this as a reference. If you would like to join our panel of reviewers, please join in or email the editor john@inkpellet.co.uk. We hope the section inspires you to share new fiction with your pupils or to revisit old favourites yourself
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Susan Elkin participated in a panel discussion on the current state of education, focussing on the detriment to learning caused by the paucity of arts subjects in the curriculum. 1968 was the year I started teaching. My e-book memoir Please Miss We’re Boys, details it amusingly – I hope. By some mysterious coincidental synergy, I was […]
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Sometimes great ideas spring from the unlikeliest of places. In 1974, an actual chicken shed on the very limits of North London was the venue for one of the first inclusive theatre companies in the UK. Mark Glover uncovers the routes of the Chickenshed. Susan Jamson, Chickenshed’s Press and PR Manager, has been with the […]
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The NT Connections Festival celebrated its 21st Anniversary with a record number of participating groups. Susan Elkin looks at this year’s final performers. Our play is preferred” shouts Bottom gleefully to Peter Quince and the other rude mechanicals in A Midsummer Night’s Dream when he hears that that they’ve been picked to perform at the Theseus’s three […]
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In the last issue of Ink Pellet, Mark Glover, reviewed Lucy Kerbel’s book All Change Please, a rally cry to achieving greater equality in the theatre. The book focused, in part on the influence of young people, and the impact they can make. Here, he delves into the work of the National Youth Theatre, to […]
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GRAHAM HOOPER takes in the Cornelia Parker exhibition, combining visual and verbal allusions that trigger cultural metaphors and personal associations.
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SUSAN ELKIN visited Rose Bruford College to view first-hand the excellent classes offered to young people. Rose Bruford College is an unusual drama school. Operating without a city centre presence, it is tucked away in a quietly rural and very beautiful corner of Sidcup in the grounds of the old house (complete with lake!) which […]
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With, hopefully, warmer evenings set to continue though the coming months, Susan Elkin guides us through some of the open air theatre highlights available this summer. Open air theatre is one of those gloriously British triumphs of hopes over experience. At its best a night at Regents Park or in the grounds of a stately […]
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NYT CPD & Summer Season National Youth Theatre’s latest Teacher CPD Event will take place on Thursday 1 June when the NYT will be opening up their rehearsal room to educators, giving them the opportunity to watch an open rehearsal of Dennis Kelly’s DNA in advance of its limited run at the home of National […]
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As champions of new writing, the Royal Court plays a vital role in the link between education and the theatre. Here their artistic director, Vicky Featherstone, chats to Susan Elkin Vicky Featherstone’s middle name might just as well be “new writing”. It has characterised everything this dynamic woman, currently artistic director at the Royal Court, […]
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This year’s CILIP Awards are in full swing, with opportunities for your students to influence the outcome. Susan Elkin sets the scene Have you read One by Sarah Crossan? It’s a first person narrative by a teenage conjoined twin facing separation from her other half. It’s written in blank verse and I’m pretty sure you […]