LOCAL STUDENTS INVITED TO BRING SHAKESPEARE TO LIFE WITH MAKE A SCENE COMPETITION

High school students in your local area are being challenged to show the Shakespeare in their everyday lives by entering the 2010 Make A Scene competition presented by Optus and Bell Shakespeare, with big prizes up for grabs.

Make A Scene, which is run online at www.optus.com.au/makeascene, invites students around Australia to select a Shakespeare quote and express it their own way via any medium - be it a drawing, photograph, illustration, animation, or movie submitted electronically as a still image or movie file.

The National Prize winner will be awarded $5,000, the new 250GB MacBook worth $1,299 and an Apple iPhone. If the winning student’s entry has been supported by their teacher or school, the school will also win $5,000 and a semi-pro DV camera worth $5,799.

Entries will be judged by leading Australian actor and theatre director John Bell, giving local students the chance to have their work appraised by the industry’s top talent.

How to Enter Make a Scene
Shakespeare and teenagers have a lot in common. They are both immersed in everyday dramas about love, jealousy, sibling rivalry and family feuds. They both coin new sayings and words. Shakespeare thought life was a stage, and teenagers act like they're on one.

Make A Scene encourages students to approach Shakespeare in a language they understand while giving teachers the opportunity to utilise technology within the prescribed curriculum.

This year students can choose to interpret one of the following quotes:

• Graze where you will, you shall not house with me! Romeo And Juliet 3:5:188
• This is the very painting of your fear Macbeth 3:4:60
• Men should be what they seem. Othello 3:3:129
• Neither a borrower nor a lender be Hamlet 1:3:75
• Love look not with the eyes, but with the mind. A Midsummer Night's Dream 1:1:234

Entries can be uploaded from today on the Make A Scene website, and close on Friday 1 October.

"This is the fourth Make A Scene competition that Bell Shakespeare and Optus are hosting online to connect students with Shakespeare," Jann Kohlman, Optus Group Manager, Sponsorship and Community Programs said. "Every year entries become more interactive as students from right around the country embrace technology to find creative ways to express Shakespeare."

John Bell said, "Judging the Make A Scene competition is something I look forward to each year, and the entries continue to surpass my expectations. With technology a key component of Australian secondary education, Make A Scene provides a unique mechanism through which students can explore their own contemporary interpretations of Shakespeare, helping them to access Shakespearian language on their own terms."

Full details on how to enter, entry categories, prizes, judges and terms and conditions can be found on the Make A Scene website, www.optus.com.au/makeascene.

For more information please contact Lucy Waldron-Brown, Bell Shakespeare Publicist on (03) 9419 8837, or Kasia Ciszak, Corporate Affairs Manager, Optus on (02) 8082 8315.