John Sturgis

Primary dread: the horror of school plays, fêtes and trips

  • From Spectator Life

Primary school drama has a rule which is a variation on Chekhov’s gun principle: if your child has a part in the school play they won’t get to speak until the end of the final act. And you’ll have to sit through the part of every other child before their moment finally comes.

You will have to go. You will have to go and sit on a very small chair for a very long time, watching other people’s children perform ineptly before you get your ten seconds of joy at your own darling’s turn (which you won’t get to see properly anyway as you’re tasked with filming it).

The school calendar is peppered with special events which, for the children, represent welcome breaks from the monotony of the three Rs and the chance to be excitable with friends; for parents, however, they are fraught with problems, both logistical and social.

The former comes in the way of challenges that would stump most candidates on The Apprentice: ‘I need an Egyptian pharaoh costume.’

Written by
John Sturgis

John Sturgis is a freelance journalist who has worked across Fleet Street for almost 30 years as both reporter and news editor

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