On Monday 16th October, The White City Youth theatre (WCYT) were able to watch a Bush theatre production called 'Ramona tells Jim'.

The play set in the Scottish highlands tells the tale of the whirlwind romance of the two protagonists, Ramona and Jim, in their late teens. This relationship is abruptly ended when Ramona makes false claims of being sexually assaulted by a mutual connection. They meet again 15 years later when Jim is in a relationship with his 19 year old girlfriend Pocahontas. Ramona decides to reveal the truth about this scandal after much deliberation. This then causes the continuation of the romantic relationship Ramona and Jim once had in the Scottish Highlands and the saddening heartbreak of Pocahontas.

The clever depiction of awkward teenage relationships by Sophie Wu enabled the audience to relate and understand the characters of Ramona and Jim especially the WCYT attendees who were of a similar age bracket. The intimate acting space helped bring the whole production to life. Many of the theatre members later commented how the felt the overall experience was “Amazing!”. This reaction was further reflected in other audience members such as Natalie Dew who tweeted the play was “utterly joyous”.

Hopefully this experience of being an audience member will help the WCYT actors perform better as they developed a better understanding of the emotions and reactions of an audience member in addition to inspiration on how they wish to portray characters on stage.