Natanya Milner – Head of Primary School

Aladdin Jnr

What a wonderful week! I can’t believe that I am FINALLY writing a Ma Nishma article on the other side of Aladdin Jnr. I would like to thank you everyone involved, in what has been years in the making! I’m not sure how many people realise the number of hiccups that happened along this journey with of course, Covid, but also unforeseen staffing changes, ticketing issues and more. The reason I mention this is because it is a testament to the commitment and resilience of the staff and children that this show happened, let alone so fabulously, and I would like to acknowledge the tireless efforts of the team involved.

The way we structure our musicals is such a perfect reflection of how we make decisions at Emanuel. We are guided by a desire to provide all students with opportunities to be involved and inspired. The scripts detail the roles for the main cast, and we are committed to a fair process to select these students from our Year 5 and Year 6 students. These students show special talent for acting, singing and dancing and we aim to provide them with a deep opportunity to foster these talents. We also then make the decision to include all the other students from the other classes, as a part of the show. Our purpose here is to give all the children a chance to feel the buzz of performing and the need to rehearse something multiple times for it to be of a high enough quality to bring to an audience. We love that we have a unique opportunity to inspire the younger students. By involving them in the process and working with the main cast, it is something to work towards for when they are in Years 5 and 6. Hopefully our wonderful main cast have created some budding performers from the younger years.

There are so many people to thank but I would like to specifically acknowledge:

• Brooke Oldfield who, as the Producer for the show, was tasked with coordinating scheduling, costumes, set, props, class choreography and more. Brooke managed to stay calm under pressure and keep all the balls in the air with grace!
• Remi Owen who has been an incredible Music Director, also picked up vocal coaching as a part of his role. He has shown incredible flexibility and positivity, as well as high expectations and a can-do attitude at all times.
• Will Torney who stepped in as Director last term and has managed to pick up from where Peter left off to pull the show together with flair!
• Sarit Spira and Jessica Yendell who assisted as vocal coaches to support the main cast to perform so confidently and capably.
• Steven Kramer and Novak Manojlovic for the wonderful accompaniment through rehearsals and of course, to all the fabulous musicians who performed at the shows Matthew Bruce, Daniel Burley, Stefano Caroleo, Steven Kramer, Alex McNeil and Eamon Penner-Dilworth.
• Laura Scahill for being so flexible and generous with her time and expertise to assist with the main cast’s choreography.
• Nicole Esra who has been an amazing support as Production Assistant and has kept so many of the small details addressed so capably – helping to keep us all calm along the way.
• Carrie Thomas who scheduled and scheduled and scheduled to ensure the rehearsals and shows were well staffed and ran smoothly.
• Stacey Rosenfeld who uses her years of experience with our musicals to jump in and lend a hand wherever and whenever needed.
• Ben Marshall, with the assistance of High School students Aaron Berkowitz and Dylan Budai, for the professional lighting support, advice and guidance through rehearsals and the show.
• Gena Yeomans, Belinda Levin and Michelle Favero for supporting all the logistics of ticketing, programs, communications and more.
• Hebrew Department for teaching the finale in Hebrew and ensuring we were able to infuse this wonderful tradition into our show.
• The Emanuel Primary Staff who happily gave up their weekend and evenings to supervise, organise and support the students to participate in the show.
• Yaffa, Ariel and the Canteen Staff for keeping us well fed and content ready for the shows.
• The whole maintenance team, for all the behind-the-scenes hard work
• Ofer Levy for taking amazing photographs (a small selection of these can be seen below and they have been made available to Primary parents.)

To all the students in Years K-6, thank you for performing so enthusiastically and doing an incredible job, bravely stepping up and entertaining our audience.

Special acknowledgement goes to our main cast, production crew and runners:

• Main Cast: Aaron Eisenberg (Genie), Jemima Hockley (Jasmine) and Ethan Ickowicz (Aladdin), Evie Brodovky, Olive Byrne, Mia Chesler, Arya Cohen, Saskia Esra, Jazzy Goodman, Noa Goodstone, Tamar Granot, Joel Hersh, Hana Hurwitz, Ami Lipman, Mirabella Marshall, Tabbi Masnick, Mahli Olian, Frankie Paez, Nadav Pollak, Sophia Rule, Millie Samuel, Leah Sebel, Lily Smaller, Noaa Smily, Reina Steiner-Carrion, Orlando Van Der Starre, Tal Wajsam and Nava Weiss
• Production Crew: Phoenix Gien, Mia Goodridge, Grace Lyons, Eva Meer and Kayla Strous
• Runner: Ben Pellow

Thank you to the parents of the main cast who have also schlepped and co-ordinated schedules to ensure the students were available for after school and weekend rehearsals. We are so grateful for this support and commitment.

A final thank you to everyone in our community who attended. We loved performing for you and we are grateful for your ongoing support!

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Staffing Changes

Drishti Nanwani has been on a temporary contract at Emanuel for the past few years. We have been so grateful for her flexibility as she has taken on roles such as Innovation Teacher, as well as Year 2 and Year 3 Classroom Teacher. From next year, Drishti will return to us as a casual teacher.

We are so lucky to have had Drishti working with classes over recent years and we are also thrilled to know we will have such an experienced and wonderful casual teacher for 2023.