Part 3 of the Mikado performed at the end of the Holiday Programme run by the Helen O'Grady Drama Academy

Children from all over Africa will be attending the The Helen O’Grady Drama Academy’s famous holiday musical stage school programme which aims produced a musical in a week at the Athenaeum in Newlands from 13^th -18^th December.

Children from age 5 to 18 have the opportunity of participating in this vibrant course which takes the youngsters on an educational journey through musical theatre. Using the challenging Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera, ‘The Mikado’, the children will learn the art of Japanese dance and movement, and how to sing with clear articulation in the famous operetta style.

Very exciting for the Cape Town children was the addition of 25 young actors visiting from Nigeria and Kenya. These young people come to South Africa to experience the high levels of expertise in musical theatre training as well as meet people from another country and culture. 

In previous years, the Academy has written and performed new musicals including ‘Oliver Twisted’, the Charles Dickens story set in Cape Town, ‘Slave’, a true story about a slave in Cape Town, ‘We are the Dream’ about the life of Martin Luther King Jr. This year ‘The Mikado’ was chosen.