The History Boys by Alan Bennett
30 August - 7 September 2013
Affectionate, bittersweet and deeply funny, The History Boys captures the bravado, humour and vulnerability of young men navigating their way to adulthood.
In the quest for places at an Oxbridge university, the boys encounter distinctly incompatible teaching styles. In Hector's classes, they role-play in French, sing, quote literature, wisecrack and re-enact classic Hollywood films. The Headmaster wants the school higher in the league tables and the boys to have polish, edge. Irwin, the new supply teacher, educates them in counterfactual history, Christ's 'fourteen foreskins' and how to 'take an angle'. The play reveals the unsentimental education of life: an unrequited love triangle, academic rivalries, lessons in judicious lying, the difference between success in learning and life. Bennett laments lost values of a past time, with his characteristic light touch.
“a mix of drama, comedy, poetry, popular song, ancient hymns, anecdote and aphorism”
Cast
Posner: Philip Garrity
Dakin: Sam Howard
Scripps: Callum Webber
Rudge: Will Collin
Timms: Conor Maxwell
Akthar: Antony Aiono
Lewis: David Bowers-Mason
Lockwood: Sam Domett
Crowther: Ryan Wood
Hector: Clive Lamdin
Irwin: Carl Watkins
Headmaster: Nick Clothier
Mrs. Lintott: Fiona Sneyd
TV Director: Alice Kennedy
Understudy: Cadell Millwood
Production Team
Artistic Director: Gaye Poole
Producer: Brendan Theodore
Production Assistant: Ngaia Mason
Stage Manager: Brendan Theodore
Lighting Designer: Dion Rutherford
Lighting Operator: Eliot Jessep
Sound Operator: Shaun Phillips, Chase ten Hove, Lance Chapman
Props Master: Tendai Sithole
Wardrobe Assistant: Natalie Foster
French Tutor: Alexander Pelham-Waerea
Singing Tutor: Michael Potts
Graphic Designer: Abbie Foley
Stills Photographer: Rickki Turnwald
Reviews
Join Bennett's boys for lesson in fun - Sam Edwards, Waikato Times
New land gives new life to old land play - Gail Pittaway, Theatreview
History Boys a gem to look back on - Geoff Lewis, Hamilton Press