The Sixth Form Revue
Unfortunately because The Sixth Form Revue video contains young children and teachers I am not allowed to show it. However, I will attach pictures and short clips of us, the sixth form, to convey the same impression.
Under normal circumstances, The Sixth Form Revue would be a massive event hosted by the sixth form, in the school theatre. It would be a talent show where students in the younger years could perform to win a prize as sixth form performed funny scenes and skits between each act. There would be a yearly theme that they would have to come up with, and that is what their skits would be based off of. However, when our year joined sixth form, we were in the midst of a global pandemic. We, as a very dramatic year, were adamant on doing The Revue as it has become a right of passage at our school. So, we had to come up with a creative solution. By this time, I had already created my short film and people in my year knew I was competent with the filming process so asked if I would mind helping out. Of course I was immediately on board.
After a short deliberation, we came to the conclusion that the perfect theme for the years revue was 'Gogglebox'. We planned that we could have our teachers as the people on Gogglebox and we, the sixth form, would recreate famous TV moments for them to watch and react to. However, to not spoil the surprise for them, we would show different sets of teachers different skits. As for the talent show element, we would record all of the performances and use them as the advert breaks in our TV show.
Since this was going to be a long shoot, as it had to intersperse with our lessons and other school commitments as well as more lockdowns, I trained a couple other people on how to use the camera and recording equipment so that they could film and run sound when I wasn't there and also learn how to film as a skill.
Skits
This is a video of all the skits of TV moments, we recreated, before I edited in the teacher commentary, intros, credits and adverts. Since the music overlays were one of the last things I did when editing, the last two clips only have the music that was playing at the time. This project was a massive year group effort and everyone had a fun time, acting, filming and dancing.
For the revue we took TV moments from reality TV, news, talent competitions and recreated both UK and US clips that went viral at the time.
We tried to recreate the angles and camera styles of each show, as close as we could, and utilised as many different locations around our school as possible, because not only was this a comedic, for laughs, project but it also was a physical representation of our school and community as well.
When casting each sketch, we had a sign up sheet so all roles were voluntary, however for the main characters in each we would discuss as a year group who could play the role the best coupled with who has the best connection to the role. For example, the girl playing Gordon Ramsay was the only one who had done GCSE Food and Nutrition. We did this to add more comedy for the pupils and teachers for when they watched it together.
We made sure each person was involved in the making of The Sixth Form Revue, in one way or another, whether that be acting, typing up each sketch, filming, running sound, background acting or teaching the dance routine. It was pivotal that this project be a team effort as it was such a big task and required a lot of work from everyone. It was also used to bring the sixth form together as a sort of bonding experience, and after the viewing with the whole school we could all be proud of our group achievement.
For the Gogglebox reaction element of our mock episode, we grouped our favourite teachers, who were willing to be in the film, by subject as well as groups/pairs whose dynamic we knew would work well. We told them to over-react to everything they were seeing, to help us get some funny or interesting moments. We told them to say any thought in their minds and if they have a story that relates to one of the clips, to tell the story. We also got each group to prepare a funny into or moment that we could play for the "in the ...... room" bit which, if you know the show, is a fundamental element of Gogglebox (in Lankashire....and her friend....).
Every year the head of sixth appears in The Sixth Form revue in some way or another. When the theme one year was Toy Story, he came on at the end as Andy and when it was Big Brother, he was Big Brother. So, we thought it only right for him to be the famous soft-spoken voice of Gogglebox who says what day of the week it is, what show the people are watching and who the people are. We wrote out a script for him and recorded him saying each line so that I, in editing, could overlay it as voiceover.
For the intros for each TV show, I simply recorded the video and audio from the actual shows and put them in the revue. However, for the Gogglebox intro, I went around the school filming slow moving shots of different locations that I cut together like the Gogglebox intro and with the music. When in the library, I got a shot with the beloved librarian waving to camera. This was planned as a little surprise for everyone viewing as we knew she was retiring and would not be in school by the time the revue was finished. It all payed off when I heard the sound of 'awws' as we watched the finished product.
For the credits, I wanted everyone to feel, individually, like they had completed something massive, because we had. So, each member of the sixth form had their own page credit, with a mug shot of themselves that I got their friends to send me with their nickname. The nickname would them transition into their actual name. I wanted each person to feel personally acknowledged for their work and this was a fun way to do this. For the music over the credits, I ended up using the full version of the song that makes up the Gogglebox into as it actually has quite uplifting qualities to it. Something that seems nostalgic but new at the same time, a perfect description of the revue which was new yet we knew we would all keep it as a memento forever, to look back on.
Remembering it is also a talent show, we got each of the acts, who had asked to compete, to give us a lunch time for us to record their section. We wanted each person to have a fair of a chance as possible, so we gave them as many takes as they wanted and used the raw audio with no music overlays or editing. We also shot one continuous shot for each act so that editing wasn't favouring one more than the other. After they had filmed and chosen the take they wanted to be in the revue, I got the rest of sixth form to watch each one so we could vote on a winner. I then added the winner announcement at the end of the credits.
After the credits we wanted to put a little treat at the end for the whole school. We decided we would gather a group of willing teachers to do a teacher dance. We thought it only perfect that they recreate the Zendaya dance that was the retaliation to the Tom Holland one we copied for Lip Sync Battle. We cast our most outgoing teacher as Zendaya herself and taught them a simplified version of the dance and filmed them all in the gym in just one lunch time. They all brought 'hip-hop' clothes to wear for the dance since it was to Bruno Mars' 24K Magic. The reaction to this was huge with big laughs and applauses.
Overall, this project was a success amongst our community. The students enjoyed watching the hour long episode and we enjoyed creating it. Although I may still pick apart my editing and the sound levels aren't quite right, I can still appreciate all the hard work my year and I completed. I am also glad I got to share my skills with others and help them learn about how to create something like this.
In this project I have done the editing, some filming, some costuming, some props, some direction and admin/scheduling.