By Dave Babbitt – Special to the Sydenham Current
While everything is more expensive these days, one thing that has always been expensive is winning.
I recall the years that my parents were very involved with Wallaceburg Minor Lacrosse. My father was the President for several years and I can still hear him worrying about successful teams because he said, “winning is expensive”.
It’s not that he didn’t want a team to be successful, but he understood that if a team was successful, there would be a sudden need for copious quantities of cash. Busses for playoffs that got further and further away, accommodation expenses, the obligatory Championship jackets, crests, banquet, and so on.
But that doesn’t just apply to sports teams.
Winning at anything is expensive and usually for the same reasons, but the willingness to contribute to winning sports teams is likely greater than most.
But what if an arts organization such as a dance troupe, band, artist, or acting troupe won a competition? Are individuals or organizations as quick to come to their aid?
Here’s to hoping so.
The Drama students at WDSS recently won the Lambton-Kent District National Theatre School competition with their production of “The Way Home” and are now eligible to move on to the next level.
Back when I was still teaching, the annual competition for dramatic presentations was known as the Sears Drama Festival and obviously sponsored by Sears. This was to Drama students what the Kiwanis Music Festival was to music students with one major difference.
If my band won at the Kiwanis Music Festival, that was it. We didn’t “move on” to another level, but if a school won the local Sears Drama Festival Competition, they moved on to regional competition and if successful there, to the Provincial level.
I became quite familiar with the Sears Drama Festival because for about five years, my music students along with myself would play a trumpet fanfare from the balcony of the Chatham Cultural Centre before each school’s presentation. The festival sought to mimic the fanfare played at the Stratford Festival before each performance and provide an air of class and professionalism for the students.
A friend of mine managed to snag a copy of the actual Stratford Fanfare and it sounded rather spectacular with four to five trumpets playing up in the balcony.
As there were either three or four plays each evening, I had a lot of time to kill as we only played a 30-second fanfare before each play, then had to wait for the next play to begin.
In providing this service to the festival, I managed to take in a lot of productions in the years we played. It was here that I came to see just how much work went into these students’ productions and just how serious they were about their craft.
Sears is no more, of course, but the competition carries on as the NTS Drama Fest in the hands of the National Theatre School based in Montreal and is supported by the Molson Foundation. The festival involves thousands of drama students across Canada as the competition moves through District, Regional, Zone, and Provincial levels.
My experience was that many of the school productions were written by professional playwrights, but occasionally the productions were original.
This year’s WDSS production is an entirely local product.
“The Way Home” was originally written by WDSS teacher Tyler White and was selected as the Outstanding Production at the recent Lambton-Kent competition, qualifying the production to move on to the Regional competition being held in Hamilton this year.
WDSS Drama teacher Nicki Lane said that Tyler began writing the play in January of 2025 and in May pulled the students in to make contributions to the story and have workshopped the play since early in the school year.
The play is directed by Tyler White and produced by Nicki Lane.
Synopsis of the story: a young girl by the name of Newt is running away from the Mohawk Institute Residential School. While there was nothing funny about the Residential School system, the play has quite a comedic bent in following Newt as she is running through the forest encountering traditional animal characters found in Anishinaabe culture.
The animals present themselves in the way that the animals are seen within the culture.
For example, in Anishinaabe culture, a bear is not the scary animal we think of, but a “healer and medicine guardian,” and helps Newt with a scrape on her knee that she injured on her journey.
As Newt encounters Duck, Bear, Beaver, Wolf, Fox, and a couple of bumbling police officers, there are numerous comedic moments in the play before she eventually gets home.
Aside from Tyler and Nicki, the production crew and cast are all students.
The stage manager is Lucas Greenbird, lighting design by Iris Nadhee, sound design by Caden Courteaux, assistant stage managers Dhruvi Patel and Sofia Gomez, set managers Alex Vermette and Chelsea William, and costume design by Olivia Lane.
The cast includes Angel Williams as Newt, Hazel Gibson as Dad, Sunny Gamble as Duck, Ely Hazen as Duck Posse No. 1, Abby Douglas-Blair as Duck Posse No. 2, Oliver Gray as Bear, Sakeenah Shamalisham as Beaver, Hallee Greenbird as Wolf, Ruby George as Fox, Calista Talbot as Cop No. 1, and Lindsay Stirling as Cop No. 2.
The students will present a public production at WDSS on April 9 to raise funds for their trip to the next level of competition to be presented in Hamilton on April 22.
The troupe is hoping to raise enough funds for their bus and an overnight stay, allowing them to be fresh for their presentation, but as Nicki told me, the bus alone is three times the cost of room rentals.
I urge supporters of the arts to attend the public presentation on April 9 and be generous.
If a hockey team were in a championship series, the stands would be full.
Let’s demonstrate some support for these amazing students and their hard work, helping them move on to an even higher level of the competition.
Remember, winning is expensive.
