September newz

Hello Lockdowners,

By now most of you who are owed money will have received your first checks. If not, they are on their way to you! Extra special thanks to Michael and Fila who defered payment til we get more money in, I appreciate it very much. I will let you all know when final payments are ready.

Many thanks and big hugs to each and every one of you for your patience and understanding. It was wonderful to have an opportunity to touch base with you all on the phone, either directly or through your parents, last week. It was great to hear your news, and about all your awesome summer adventures.

"Lockdown" was a huge success. Working on it was definately my highlight for 2008-9, and this was 100 per cent due to the pleasure of meeting and working with each and every one of you. Thank you for being part of my life and for the amazing opportunity to create this wonderful work.

As most of you know I faced a number of personal challenges this year. Living with cancer was/is one of them. But having our workshops to look forward to helped me stay positive through very difficult times. Also, my business took a big hit from the recession, and being sick didn't help. There were a number of opportunities I could not take advantage of because of my illness. Once again, your understanding meant we were able to stick together as a creative team. The result is an amazing product, proof that Art surmounts all challenges!

I know and hope that the rich experiences you gained while working on Lockdown will serve you well in many situations to come. Feel wonderful, because you are powerful, talented and loved. Keep in touch and let me know how you go, where your life journeys lead you.

Finally, I want to let you know that we will remount the play in the Spring of 2010. Auditions are scheduled for January, and there will be workshops/rehearsals in April to take the script and production to the next stage. Performance dates are the last two weeks of May, 1st week of June. Let me know if you are interested in participating and I will keep you posted going forward.

All best wishes and much love,

Frances-Anne

LOCKDOWN Learning Activity Guide

For students aged 12-19.

Before the play

Reflect on the title, Lockdown. This word seems to be in the newspapers a lot these days. What sort of play are you expecting to see? (This might be a group discussion prior to the first viewing)

Google "high-school"+"Lockdown". Collect and print out newspaper articles, editorials and other documents that you come up with. Discuss it with a group partner and, together, make a list of five questions that you both agree that you would like to have answered. Keep these until after the play. (An activity for partners)

Write down any personal experiences you may have of a Lockdown.

During the Play

Students should focus on the content (that is, the storyline, topics, issues, ideas, etc.) as well as on how the content is presented (language, music, drama, movement, etc.) If at all possible, students may jot down notes as they watch.

After the play - Group Discussion

What are the main topics/ideas of the play? Give reasons for your responses.

Get together with the partner with whom you created five questions. Decide which questions were answered while you watched the play and what remains to be answered.

Prepare to share your questions and the answers “received” during the play with your class.

What questions were the most common within the group? Were answers similar? Discuss differences and similarities in the questions and the answers. (#1 & #2 could be debriefing exercises for the whole group right after viewing.)

(The following may require seeing the play more than once)

Discuss the methods of presentation. Then, discuss their effectiveness. Would you have done anything differently? What and How? Why? Explain. (This could be a small group or partner activity.)

Individual assignments

Either:

Write a newspaper/magazine review of the play. Remember to award stars!

Or:

Discuss the play (on tape or video that you have created) as if you were a television film critic. Remember to give “thumbs up” or “thumbs down”.

Or:

Design a Lockdown Playbill. This should include a brief outline of the play as well as a short review.

Caribbean Camera :The Learning Curve

The Learning Curve
Caribbean Camera July 4th

In large states public education will always be mediocre for the same reason that in large kitchens the cooking is usually bad. –Friedrich Nietzsche

If you haven’t been to this year’s Fringe Festival to see Lockdown be sure to catch one of the final two performances, Friday or Sunday. You’re doing yourself a disservice by missing this play, especially if you graduated high school more than four or five years ago. The minimalist set and strategic lighting keep the story moving along swiftly, using the whole stage and 13-character ensemble to full advantage. Lockdown juggles so many issues so effortlessly it is best summarized as a theatrical version of that age-old paradox, irresistible force meets immovable object: primal youthful exuberance vs. modern institutional bureaucracy.
It offers slice-of-life laughter, but these moments simply reinforce the sense that the tension is being ratcheted up throughout. Knowing this play offers an honest portrayal of the current high school environment may leave you unsettled, but that’s precisely the point. What may shock you more than the action on stage, however, is the realization that this lamentable state of affairs could be irreparable.
In May the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) announced that “for the first time Canada’s overall score on the Composite Learning Index has declined.” The CLI tracks both formal and informal learning indicators in 4,700 communities across the country, “whether in school, at home, in the workplace or in the community. The indicators are grouped under four pillars—Learning to Know, Learning to Do, Learning to Live Together, and Learning to Be.” And only one of them is responsible for the CLI decline.
“This landmark drop in overall CLI is being driven by a decrease in the index’s ‘Learning to Be’ pillar, which includes informal learning,” said CCL president Dr. Paul Cappon. “This includes attendance at museums, art galleries, performing arts or cultural events, and reported household spending on magazines, newspapers and other reading materials.” Federal funding for these informal learning resources has been repeatedly slashed over the years, a trend Stephen Harper heartily endorses since he considers the arts “a niche issue” at best, subversive at worst. The ‘Learning to Do’ pillar prevented a larger overall drop in the CLI thanks to its “marked increase in work-related learning.” In other words, if it ain’t earning it ain’t learning.
But even within a fiscal-centric paradigm, discerning a coherent overall strategy is difficult. In 1999 education spending absorbed 6.6% of Canadian GDP. In 2002 it was 5.2% of GDP despite a cumulative GDP increase of 10% over the same period. And although the number of people 15 years and older attending school, including part-timers, decreased by 1.344 million (7.2%) from 1996 to 2001, StatsCan figures show we spent 6% more in actual dollars in 2001/02 than in 1997/98. As the population grew (1.16 million or 4% from 1996 to 2001) so did the economy and education spending increased accordingly, in terms of real dollars. But the amount spent as a percentage of GDP and as a percentage of total government expenditure continued its long-term decline. Whereas education made up more than 15% of governmental spending in 1980, by 2001 it had fallen to 12.5%.
It would be tempting to infer the real dollar increase was instrumental in reducing the national pupil-teacher ratio, which fell from 17.6 children per teacher in 1996/97 to 16.2 in 2001/02, but these numbers are deceptive. Support staff who are not regular classroom instructors, such as special education teachers, librarians, principals and vice-principals, were included in the calculations. The 94,000 additional employees (a 9% increase) in “educational and related services” from 2004 to 2008 will help maintain funding increases and will in all likelihood help reduce pupil-teacher ratios further, but they won’t reduce the number of pupils per classroom.
“My principal aim is to secure the means for directing political and moral opinions,” said Napoleon Bonaparte when as Emperor he created a publicly funded, compulsory school system in post-Revolutionary France, the world’s first. And as Lockdown illustrates, motives have changed little since 1806. With the tantalizing promise of becoming whatever one chooses, children are offered little incentive to choose any one thing in particular. The standard, one-size-fits-all formula is simplicity itself: get a good job after a degree, make a few bucks and spend them on thee.
Sadly, until or unless we start cultivating young minds instead of grooming them to be consumerist zombies, Lockdown’s skilfully crafted dystopia is here to stay.
7 juillet ’09

"The More the Merrier" (TmTm) Arts Radio, CIUT 89.5 FM Fringe Festival '09: Frances-Anne Solomon's LOCKDOWN

From "The More the Merrier" (TmTm) Arts Radio, CIUT 89.5 FM
Fringe Festival '09: Frances-Anne Solomon's LOCKDOWN

Lockdown
by Frances-Anne Solomon
(www.ledaserene.ca)
presented by Leda Serene films from Toronto, ON

Frances-Anne Solomon’s new play Lockdown, takes us into the new world of some inner city Canadian high schools. Post "lockdown", how will students behave under a new set of rules and the constant presence of armed police officers in their hallways and classrooms? Schools used to be a safe haven for students, but how will some of them now function when they are exposed to violence in their homes, community and, now, school? We peer into the lives of several young people, moving with them from classroom to living room as answers are revealed. As adults, our own culpability is also in question as we watch this play unfold. Please bring some young people with you to see this play. The young cast is incredibly natural, and legendary Jamaican actress Leonie Forbes is at her usual best. Tickets are $10 each.

Director: Frances-Anne Solomon
Cast: Leonie Forbes, Michael Miller
Audience: General Audience
90 min

Venue 10: George Ignatieff Theatre, 15 Devonshire Place (south of Bloor)
Thu, July 2 8:15 PM
Fri, July 3 1:15 PM
Mon, July 6 10:45 PM
Tue, July 7 1:00 PM
Fri, July 10 4:00 PM
Sun, July 12 8:30 PM

For more information about the festival, please visit www.fringetoronto.com or call 416-966-1062

Toronto Fringe 09: ‘Icarus Redux’, ‘Weaverville Waltz’ & many more By Jory Brophy • July 6, 2009 • Category: Features, Theatre

Lockdown
Rated: 6 out of 10
Venue 10: George Ignatieff Theatre

It’s a situation every parent fears: the announcement that the high school is locked down after a violent incident has occurred. In this new play, that’s just the beginning before the action flashes back to the events leading up to the lockdown. This is Degrassi High with an extra edge, featuring the nastiest trio of fist-fighting, double-crossing girls (Nikola Gorolova, Chrystelle Robinson and Gena Joella Sylvester) you’re likely to see outside of prison. Written and directed by award-winning Toronto film producer Frances-Anne Solomon, the play includes a strong ensemble cast of students including bad boy Vusani (played by rapper Lameck Williams).

The fight scenes were exceptionally well choreographed and the characters sketched carefully in this 90-minute production. That said, the play could still use a good pruning, eliminating awkward scene transitions that would move the action along more seamlessly. Character motivations and relationships were sometimes confusing, especially considering there were a dozen actors.

Unfortunately the play doesn’t make full use of the talented Jamaican actress Leonie Forbes as the principal. However, Michael Miller is the glue in the play, handling the dual and opposing roles as the teacher and also the newly-paroled older brother of one of the students.

The Stayner Sun: Local actor part of Fringe

Local actor part of Fringe
The Stayner Sun
Author: Michael Gennings, Staff
Date: Jun 30, 2009

A young actor from Stayner is appearing on stage in a production that’s part of the well-known Toronto Fringe Festival, a smorgasbord of theatrical shows that can be seen in the city from July 1-12.

In Lockdown, a new play by award-winning director Frances-Anne Solomon, Lauren Bunn, 17, plays a troubled high school student.

A backgrounder for the show says “Lockdown’s explosive fictional story traces the fortunes of a diverse group of people held hostage during a high school lockdown. The play’s high octane script picks apart the violence that threatens to undermine their dreams.”

Last week, Bunn, a Grade 11 student at Stayner Collegiate Institute, talked about the play and her role in it.

“The idea for it comes from real-life events in the city,” she said.

Bunn described her character as a laid-back kind of girl who likes to read and write.

Still, she lives in what Bunn calls a dysfunctional home. Her half-sister in the movie is black and into dealing drugs and running a prostitution business.

She has a half-brother, also black, with his own set of problems and their mother, a single parent, is depressed and working three jobs to make ends meet.

Bunn said her character hardens as the play progresses.

And the play’s ending is somewhat tumultuous.

“There’s a happy ending for some characters but people die, relationships are broken and love is found,” she explained.

Bunn acknowledged the play contains some pretty heady material but said that’s what drew her to it.

“The storyline from the beginning struck me as interesting,” she said. “And the characters’ stories too.”

A native of Stayner, where life is considerably slower and safer – Bunn’s Toronto-area cast mates call her Honky Tonk, a reference to her small town roots – Bunn said Lockdown has been a real learning experience.

“It’s opened my eyes personally to a lot of things,” she said. “You might not want to see this, many might feel offended, but it’s the truth, the way life is for many young people. If we don’t put this type of thing on stage and make it known…we ignore the problem and that’s the last thing that will help.”

Bunn auditioned for the play last summer and got a call back but failed to land a role.

However, when another actor left the production Bunn was offered a part and accepted.

“This is the largest thing I’ve been involved with so far,” she noted. “It’s been a great opportunity. I’ve met so many talented, nice people.”

Bunn said she’s always been interested in acting. Her first gig was in Clearview Community Theatre’s Gone with the Breeze, a musical comedy, when she was 8.

She hopes to pursue acting full-time after high school.

A special launch for Lockdown was held Thursday at TOTA Lounge, 592 Queen St., W., in Toronto, allowing guests a sneak peek of selected scenes from the play.

The play can be seen at the George Ignatieff Theatre, Trinity College, the University of Toronto, 15 Devonshire Place, just south of Bloor Street West and east of Spadina Road.

Show times are Wed., July 1 at 6:30 p.m., Thurs., July 2 at 8:15 p.m., Fri., July 3 at 1:15 p.m., Mon., July 6 at 10:45 p.m., Tues., July 7 at 1 p.m. Fri., July 10 at 4 p.m. and Sun., July 12 at 8:30 p.m.

For tickets call 416-966-1062.

For more information about the Toronto Fringe Festival, visit www.fringetoronto.com.

FRANCES-ANNE SOLOMON PUTS ...Toronto Fringe Fest on Lockdown

FRANCES-ANNE SOLOMON PUTS ...Toronto Fringe Fest on Lockdown

Trinidad Guardian

Published: 28 Jun 2009

This July, CaribbeanTales, in association with Leda Serene Films, will stage the world premiere of award-winning director Frances-Anne Solomon’s new theatrical production Lockdown. The staging will take place during the 2009 Toronto Fringe Festival which runs from July 1-12.

Lockdown’s explosive fictional story traces the fortunes of a diverse group of young people held hostage during a high school lockdown. The play’s script picks apart the violence that threatens to undermine their dreams. It stars Jamaican film and theatre icon Leonie Forbes (What My Mother Told Me, Lord Have Mercy, A Winter Tale) and rising Toronto star Michael Miller (A Winter Tale, Get Rich or Die Trying), alongside an ensemble of young actors selected from city-wide auditions held across Toronto. The script was developed over the past year, through a collaborative improvisational process with the entire team. Produced with the support of the Ontario Trillium Foundation, and the Toronto Police Services Board, Lockdown’s Fringe theatre performances will take place at the George Ignatieff Theatre, Trinity College, University of Toronto, 15 Devonshire Place.

A special launch event was hosted by CaribbeanTales took place at the TOTA Lounge 592 Queen Street West last Thursday. Guests were treated to a sneak preview of selected scenes from the play, and got an opportunity to meet and talk with the actors. As the city’s largest theatre event, the annual Toronto Fringe Festival embraces more than 100 theatre companies from Ontario, across Canada, and around the world. With more than 12 days of stage performances, the festival offers full accessibility to all members of the community, while enabling emerging and established artists to present their ideas regardless of content, form and style. Lockdown follows the success of Solomon’s highly acclaimed feature film A Winter Tale.

Among many prestigious, international awards, most recently at FESPACO 2009 (Africa’s Oscars held biannually in Burkina Faso, West Africa), A Winter Tale was nominated for and won Special Mention in the Paul Robeson Diaspora Award category. As founder and artistic director of CaribbeanTales, Solomon is an accomplished filmmaker, writer, director and producer whose recent projects also include Heart Beat — a documentary series profiling Caribbean-Canadian musical creators; Literature Alive, a multi-facetted multimedia project profiling Caribbean authors; and the Gemini-nominated sitcom Lord Have Mercy.

LOCKDOWN

CARIBBEAN CAMERA, JUNE 30TH 2009

BY Jean Hodgkinson

Lockdown

The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next. -Abraham Lincoln

“What shocked me most was how mature the kids are,” director Frances-Anne Solomon told me at Thursday night’s sneak preview of her upcoming Fringe Festival play, Lockdown. Referring to the age-old “hierarchy that you assume exists between people who are in their teens and somebody like me, who is really an adult—that just went out the window.” Solomon, who also wrote the play, is speaking here of the cast members who are still in high school. “There was never any sense that I knew more than they did.” This seemed to reflect the general mood of the production’s elders, which is hardly surprising given the play’s subject matter.
An “explosive fictional story, it begins with an emergency lockdown: students trapped in their classes” while the “parents wait helplessly outside and police officers swarm.” Among the writer/director, three of the older actors, and two stage management crew members I interviewed, only one had experienced high school lockdowns as a student—assistant stage manager Vanessa Gervais, a second-year Ryerson theatre student raised in Florida. Yet, Solomon advises, type “lockdown Toronto” into an online search engine and you’ll get a list of incidents whose frequency is best measured in weekly, not annual increments. And they aren’t restricted to Toronto.
Since the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School lockdowns, “referred to as the new fire drill, have become increasingly common,” the Vancouver Sun reported in 2007. “Schools in Toronto, Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Ottawa and Montreal are among those across Canada that conduct regular lockdown drills at least twice a year.” Ryan Ishmael, the on-stage police officer, observes that students “see school almost as a jail now. In lockdown, they’re treated like prisoners.” With the exception of Gervais, Ishmael’s sentiment, that Lockdown reveals “more truth than people actually realize,” was common.
Finlandia Casellas portrays a mother at her wit’s end, a role she sympathizes with. “I’m the mother of an 11-year-old boy,” she lamented, “and I’m scared for my son when he gets to high school. I was shocked to know that they’re having all these lockdowns.” Casellas understands that times have changed, however, and this leaves her with mixed feelings since, she says, lockdowns are ostensibly a safety procedure. In 2006 there were nearly 23,000 charges laid across Canada for incidents occurring on school property during, just before, or just after supervised hours according to the Vancouver Sun article. A StatsCan student survey, also from 2006, estimated “Overall, 2 out of every 5 students (40%) reported having been victimized.”
Lockdown is Solomon’s response to the findings of the Falconer Report, released after the inquest into the May 2007 murder of C.W. Jeffreys Collegiate student Jordan Manners. “That really shocked me,” she admitted. “That was the lynchpin.” The StatsCan survey estimated 62,000 violent acts were committed by students in 2006 and, of the half dozen “types” of acts listed, “carrying a weapon” and “group fights” totalled 88%. These problems are addressed head-on in Lockdown, plus a whole lot more. Sexual violence—“rape” says Solomon, correcting her terminology—drugs and prostitution all contribute to the plot’s explosive mix.
Recognizing that our schools should be institutions of learning, the cast and crew expressed their hope the play would, above all, improve student/parent communications. And Michael Miller, who plays two characters, offered the insightful commentary that educators might keep kids interested in their studies by improving, say, the mechanics of history class. “A problem is that history is taught in bubbles,” he explains. “There’s a continuum, but they don’t teach it like that.”
A potentially controversial element is the play’s realism. Lockdown’s scenes are built around actual high school experiences and although the characters are indeed fictional, they were invented by the cast members portraying them. Solomon was initially concerned about staging some of the violence too realistically, but says the students told her bluntly: “Well, it’s reality. It happens all the time.” An accomplished writer, director and producer in the world of filmmaking, this is Solomon’s first live theatre production since studying the craft at university. “I’m having the time of my life,” she enthused when asked how she was coping with the change of pace.
This year’s Fringe Festival runs from July 1 to 12 and Lockdown begins its set of 7 performances on the first day, Canada Day, and tickets are $10. For show times and location follow the Lockdown links at the www.caribbeantales.ca website.
30 juin ’09

July 1st-12th: Lockdown! At The Fringe Festival...

MOODY'S GLOBAL, July 02, 2009

July 1st-12th: Lockdown! At The Fringe Festival...

CaribbeanTales in conjunction with Leda Serene Films, Ontario Trillium Foundation, and the Toronto Police Services Board, celebrated Canada Day on July 1st with the world premiere of its new play Lockdown, at the 2009 Toronto Fringe Festival (from July 1st to 12th). Lockdown is the work of award-winning Founder and Artistic Director Frances-Anne Solomon, whose own upcoming CaribbeanTales Film Festival takes place from July 9th-12th.

Pre-View

Powerful plays like Lockdown are what we Fringe-aholics crave. Ms Solomon developed her stellar script through a collaborative improvisational process with the entire cast to further refine the ideas she explored in A Winter Tale, a multi-award-winning feature film about an Afri-men's support group in the wake of gun violence that takes the life of a young child. A week prior to the world premiere at The Fringe, we were treated to a special launch of Lockdown at the TOTA Lounge (592 Queen Street West). At TOTA, the actors performed selected scenes about what it's really like in a "normal" high school. We were shocked(!). Afterwards, we received some unexpected honesty about the performance from the play's student actors.

Actor Nikola Gorolova ("Martina", the conflicted youth character who is capable of great tenderness and great violence) pulled no punches when speaking about girls “pimping” girls or about how “useless” students feel is the presence of armed police guards in their schools. These stories are typical to the work that director/writer Solomon continues along her well-worn path, going where few local director/writers wish to tread, plunging right into our fears about class, culture, race, violence and youth. Her grand vision "walks the walk" instead of overindulging us with what Toronto Mayor Miller’s Special Assistant Sylvia Searles described to me as “talk fests”, speaking in reference to all the community town halls that we partake in yet worry that they do little to affect change, when we hear yet another news story regarding youth-on-youth violence. I say “youth-on-youth” violence as I am against referring to this problem as Afri-violence, something it is clearly not. You'll notice that Lockdown gives us a very multicultural cast dressed in matching uniforms so that we do not immediately assume the school is “urban” (read: poor and/or ethnic) and/or that the violence is about race or class, something that too many of us tend to dismiss or ignore.

Frankly, the audience felt that what we were shown and told about at TOTA was just too bad to be true. The adults appear as powerless to stop the violence as the kids involved are to understanding why they should stop being violent. And we thought our eyes were opened about what the actual play would be like when it premiered at The Fringe. Fortunately (and unfortunately), what we saw at TOTA would be just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to showing us what violence in schools is really like. (Photo: Frances-Anne Solomon, Julie Dash at Caribbean Tales Youth Film Festival 2009)

At The Fringe

As opposed to typically situating the theatre audience into a comfort zone so that we feel we know what’s going on in the play, the story of Lockdown literally explodes on the stage at the University of Toronto's George Ignatieff Theatre. A student has been killed so the police “lock down” the school by following emergency procedures that the classmates are now used to in order to keep them safe during unforeseen danger. We are suddenly and immediately in the middle of what feels like an enormous mess. The students are stuck in their classrooms, while horrified parents scramble around outside, and police officers swarm the school property. We don’t know what’s going on and are quickly uncomfortable.

International award-winner and icon Leonie Forbes stars as school Principal Higgins. Higgins spends most of her time sitting in her corner office, unmoving, distant, almost—shall we say--complacent? Like most of the police movement at the school, her movement is little. She is The Establishment and the establishment doesn't move. And it's oblivious too. In one scene, youthful teacher Mr. Wright (played by ever-expanding star Michael Miller) tries in vain to get through Higgins' tough exterior regarding the challenges that he and his students faced. These two adults can readily acknowledge how much both of them enjoy teaching Afri-history, but Higgins is defensive about Wright's concerns and sees his questions and comments as a threat to her authority. For most of the play, she appears incapable of understanding his (and others') seemingly obvious cries for help while Mr. Wright wearily walks a fine line of respect between the students and the teaching establishment. (Photo: Braeden Soltys)
And armed policemen are clearly the norm, both in Lockdown and in high schools as stated by student actor Gorolova ("Martina") during the TOTA Lounge previews. The play’s students barely notice the police presence. Could this be because the policemen barely make their presence known unless there’s a “problem”? Is this situation “normal”? Um, how is this community policing? We are left with the impression that policemen only associate with youth when there’s a need for an investigation.

Not surprisingly, actor Ryan Ishmael’s Policeman Solomon has the same challenges that any parent of a delinquent youth does. Policeman Solomon is strict, tender and desperate about getting his son to behave. The fact that he’s a policeman appears to make little difference to the situation. And he is not the stereotypical unmarried (and ethnic) father: Policeman Solomon is actually parenting his child. His child, the spineless Vusani is believably played by Lameck Williams, as a drug dealer who does little to appease his father’s frustrations about his ongoing criminal activity. Vusani and his other go-along-to-get-along classmates like Eldon Laing’s also-believable fellow drug dealer Adam are just as bad if not worse than their classmates who commit violent acts. Lockdown is a play that shows us over and over again how non-violent crime begets violent crime begets non-violent crime.

Other fascinating characters include Lauren Bunn’s highly sexualized Alicia, and Kimberley, the most violent of the eight students, portrayed by the amazingly strong Chrystelle Robinson. Yes, a female is arguably the most violent character in the play. She's the leader of the play's central female gang who teases Adam (played by an astute Ben Laurie), the romantic and would-be engineering student, the “biggest victim" in a play where everyone who is involved--or not involved--is a victim. (Photo: Chrystelle Robinson)

Lockdown’s music is sparse, adding to our ongoing discomfort with the idea of regular violence in the schools. Don’t just sit there in the audience, do something, right? Spontaneous, well-performed popular songs and rap verses by characters such as Gena Joella Sylvester‘s spirited Shyla, transition us through scenes, but do not engender either warmth or happiness. Yes, their sporadic outbursts of song help us to view the students as average, but this music (and the sparseness of it) well-contrast the teenage normalcy of the ongoing school violence. The ability to sing a beautiful song in one breath and kill someone with the next breath is positively psychopathic. Singing doesn’t disguise or distract us from this violence; it clarifies the violence for us.

Lockdown’s ending is in keeping with Solomon’s preference for climaxing realities that too many of us would rather avoid. She is less interested in “giving us hope” for the future as much as she is in starting or continuing the dialogue about the problem in order to affect change. Still, Solomon’s characters are multi-faceted and do show us both dreams and diligence as well as tenderness and caring. The humour that balances the play’s violence throughout is again there (via Miller’s character Mr. Wright) for us in the end. What is it they say: the best comedy comes from pain? Lockdown is Solomon’s idea of reality as well as her hope for the future.

Bravo Frances-Anne. Bravo.

____________

Lockdown is now on at the George Ignatieff Theatre, 15 Devonshire Place, at the University of Toronto. For more information, please visit CaribbeanTales.

Show Times (@ the George Ignatieff Theatre):

Thursday, July 2: 8:15pm to 9:45pm

Friday, July 3: 1:15pm to 2:45pm

Monday, July 6: 10:45pm to 12:15am

Tuesday, July 7: 1pm to 2:30pm

Friday, July 10: 4pm to 5:30pm

Sunday, July 12: 8:30pm to 12pm

Posted by Moody's Global, Moody's for Youth at 2:35 PM

Labels: arts and entertainment, awards, Canada, Caribbean, diversity, education, history, interpersonal relations, justice, philanthropy, politics, Toronto, women, world, youth

Lockdown: Gripping theatre, in more ways than one

FRINGE FESTIVAL

TheStar.com | Theatre | Lockdown: Gripping theatre, in more ways than one

Jul 05, 2009 04:30 AM

Comments on this story (1)

George Ignatieff Theatre, 15 Devonshire Place. Next performance tomorrow at 10:45 p.m.

Recommended

The kids are definitely not all right at the fictional Toronto high school depicted in Lockdown.

They traffic drugs and sex, dish out racist and sexist attitudes and some of them carry weapons.

This gripping new work by writer/director Frances-Anne Solomon presents us with a classroom of various types rebelling against parental, school and police authority.

It's not particularly well-staged but the performances by the mostly young cast make up for it.

Michael Miller is fine in the dual roles of an idealistic teacher and a sleazebag hood who endangers his sister's future.

A trio of singing teen femmes fatales, convincingly played by Chrystelle Robinson, Gena Joella Sylvester and Nikola Gorolova, demonstrate that the girls in the 'hood can be just as bad as the boys.

With a bigger budget and a better venue, Lockdown could pack a knock-down punch.

Bruce DeMara


Comments:

JJT, Toronto

Thank you, Star for giving " Lockdown" the credit that it deserves. Frances Anne Solomon has the talent to "pack a knock-down punch" in all of her work. Her social conscience, is a valuable resource to our communal space. Too bad the available financial resources continue to be too meagre for a realisation of her phenomenal potential. Well done, again, Frances Anne Solomon!

Submitted by joyjoy70 at 9:28 AM Tuesday, July 07 2009

SOLOMON'S LOCKDOWN CHALLENGES THE CONSCIENCE.

THE GLEANER EXTRA, JULY 2-8TH 2009.

by FRANCINE BUCHNER, TORONTO:

‘LOCKDOWN’ is a disturbing, must-see, fictional theatrical performance based on the realities of high school life in Toronto, Mississauga, Scarborough, Brampton.
After watching this performance no parent, aunt, uncle, grandparent, teacher, friend can say, they ‘didn’t know’.

Set in present day Jane Street and Finch Avenue, this urban tragedy was written and directed by award-winning film director, Frances-Anne Solomon. Solomon’s cast of new and seasoned actors “traces the fortunes of a group of young people held hostage during a high school lockdown” and reveals the shocking heights of R-Rated/adult distractions that follow these 14, 15, 16, 17 and 18 year-old children into schoolyards, hallways and classrooms, void of
PG-Parental Guidance and resulting in ‘force-ripe’ teenagers.

We do not hear about the Rosedale crimes because the parents of those children have bail money, but what happens to those whose parents do not have bail money - getting guns, girls pimping each other, buying and dealing drugs, family and teacher situations are
tackled in this play.

During a preview of selected scene enactments last Thursday at the TOTA Lounge in downtown Toronto, Solomon said the idea for the play came from the death of grade 9 student, Jordan Manners of C.W. Jeffery Collegiate Institute.

City-wide auditions were held and together with the findings of Human Rights lawyer, Julian Falconer’s report and the actual experiences of the young actors, the script was workshopped over a year, through a collaborative improvisational process.

RAW PERFORMANCE
This raw performance will force you to confront your conscience and show you how
poverty, wealth, multiculturalism, the immigrant experience is challenging the safe and comforting illusions of the Leave it to Beaver, Happy Days and The Cosby Show culture.

You are in for a treat with this play, starring Leonie Forbes as Miss Higgins and Michael Miller as Mr. Wright. 'Lockdown’ is showing at the 21st Fringe of Toronto Theatre Festival from July 1-12, 2009 inside the George Ignatieff Theatre. Tickets are $10 each
and are available via the Fringe Hotline: (416) 966-1062 or www.fringetoronto.com.

NEWZ: Lockdown gets Toronto Stars "Best Bets of the Fringe Fest"

Thursday, July 02, 2009
LOCKDOWN gets Toronto Stars "Best Bets of the Fringe Fest"

Thanks for coming out! Our opening night was fantastic.

We had an almost sold out house, and, despite nerves and other forgiveable birthing hiccups - we got a fantastic response from our audience!

Today we are featured among the 10 Best Bets of the Festival in the Toronto Star, AND in the "Emminently Watchable Preview of Fringe Highlights" in Scene Changes.

Check out the links below:

http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/WhatsOn/article/659522

http://www.scenechanges.com/theatreworld.html#top

If you missed the first show - don't despair! You can still support us by coming on out to the remaining shows!

Lockdown will be performed at the George Ignatieff Theatre (15 Devonshire Place, just south of Bloor) on the following dates:

Wednesday, July 1: 6:30-8:00 pm
Thursday, July 2: 8:15-9:45 pm
Friday, July 3: 1:15-2:45 pm
Monday, July 6: 10:45pm-12:15 am
Tuesday, July 7: 1-2:30 pm
Friday, July 10: 4-5:30 pm
Sunday, July 12: 8:30pm

To buy tickets for the show, there are three convenient ways to get them in advance:

On-Line @ www.fringetoronto.com
By Phone: 416-966-1062
In Person at the Advance Ticket Box Office: July 1-July 12, noon - 6pm at 292 Brunswick Avenue (The Fringe Club)
Tickets are $10 with special group rates available for those coming with a large party (see the Fringe website for more details).

Advance tickets can be purchased up to 3 hours prior to the start of a performance online, by phone or in person. Alternatively, tickets can be purchased at the door. Ticket orders are available for pickup at the performance venue one hour before showtime. There is a $2 service charge per order for online and phone orders.

Thank you again to all of those who made it out to our Opening Night. We look forward to seeing everyone at the remaining performances! See you at the Fringe!

See you there!

Next workshop is March 21 and 22

Hello Gang,

Just confirming that the workshop next month will be on March 21 and 22, as originally planned, and NOT March 28/29).

I know this means that Braeden may not be able to join us, but I am expecting everyone else to be there. Please comfirm your availability in writing asap.

Here are the dates going forward once again"

Pre-meet March 19th, 6pm (Bobby, Lucky, Valerie, Michael, FA)
Workshop: March 21 and 22 - 9 to 5. Everyone

Pre-meet April 23rd, 6pm (Bobby, Lucky, Valerie, Michael, FA)
Workshop: April 25 and 26 - 9 to 5. Everyone

Pre-meet May 21st, 6pm (Bobby, Lucky, Valerie, Michael, FA)
Workshop: May - 23rd to 24th. Everyone

REHEARSALS:
We will discuss rehearsal dates in June at our next workshop, based on everyone's schedule.

PERFORMANCES: There will be 7 performances at the Fringe Festival - times and dates TBA. These will take take place between JULY 1-12. Everyone.

Look forward to seeing you all soon,
FA

Merry Black History Month!

Hello everyone,

as is common knowledge, February is Black History Month so it's time to celebrate the acomplishments of politicians like Barack Obama, defendents against discrimination like Martin Luther King Jr. and inventors and scientists like George Crum who, in my opinion, invented the greatest thing known to man-kind ... the potato chip! So in short I just wanted to wish everyone an informal holiday greeting: Merry Black History Month!

Revised Lockdown dates 2009

Here are the new Locdown Workshop and Rehearsal rates as discussed last week. Please comfirm Your availability in writing asap.

See you tomorrow (Sunday 21st Feb).

Pre-meet March 19th (Bobby, Lucky, Valerie, Michael, FA)
Workshop: March 21 and 22 - 9 to 5. Everyone

Pre-meet April 23rd (Bobby, Lucky, Valerie, Michael, FA)
Workshop: April 25 and 26 - 9 to 5. Everyone

Pre-meet May 21st (Bobby, Lucky, Valerie, Michael, FA)
Workshop: May - 23rd to 24th. Everyone

REHEARSALS:
June 20th to June 29th and 22 - Dates and Times TBA. Everyone

PERFORMANCES will take take place between JULY 1-12. Dates/Times TBA. Everyone.