2006 is an important milestone for the Staplehurst Dramatic Society as it will be our 60th Anniversary. Our President, Peter Day joined the Society in 1947. Peter is an integral part of the community in Staplehurst as he taught in the village for over 50 years and is still is very involved with the youth club and the Drama Society. He performed in our recent production of A Streetcar Named Desire, playing the Doctor. And he is always seen around the village on his bicycle, he is known to generations of villagers.

Last year, as a nation, we marked 60 years since the end of the Second World War, this year is SDS’s 60th anniversary and next year is Peter Day’s 60th Anniversary as the longest serving member in the Society. So it is fitting that we should commemorate the Society’s birthday with a 60th Anniversary Production which we will be performing as part of Kent Drama Association’s 2006 Festival at the Village Centre where we are based in April.

We meet every Wednesday and have both an adult and Youth Group. Who join together each year for our Christmas Production. Last year we performed ‘Panto at the Okay Corral’, and had such fun. We are glad our audiences indulged us with their laughter and thoroughly enjoyed it. One of our leading men, was singled out, he was playing the ‘baddie’ a tad too well, that The Downs Mail Critic, thought an ASBO should have been slapped on him. We still aren’t sure if he was just a very good actor or if he was showing his true self! Mr Wright knows who he is.

We went through a period of performing Revues and sketches, but since 2005 we have introduced more diverse productions, two new plays written by a society member, Dave Henley, to Dick Turpin, Panto at the OK Corral, Streetcar Named Desire and We Happy Few. A natural progression of this change, and introducing a repertory element to our society means our performance skills have become more developed. We found that diversity of subject matter and genres have appealed to, and encouraged our audience to see our productions. Word of mouth has greatly improved our performance standing within our community. We are offering them a broader range of material, more polished productions, which serves only to improve their enjoyment.

We are now concentrating on building up our stage crew, so if there is anybody out there interested in joining take a look at our website. Come and join us for our Spring Production of We Happy Few. We need you. Emails can also be sent to us.