A Level Drama and Theatre Studies

MODULAR

Entry Requirements
It is recommended that students have a GCSE in Drama grade B.

Course Content

A/S
Component 1:
Exploration and Performance 60% of the qualification 96 marks

  • A group performance/design realisation of one key extract from a performance text and informed by the methodology of one influential practitioner.
  • A monologue or duologue performance/design realisation from one key extract from a different performance text.
  • Performer and designer routes available.

Assessment overview

  • Internally assessed and externally moderated.
  • There are three parts to the assessment:

1) A portfolio (48 marks) the portfolio submission recommendations are:

  1. it can be handwritten/typed evidence between 2000–2500 words or
  2. it can be recorded/verbal evidence between 10–12 minutes or
  3. it can be a combination of handwritten/typed evidence (between 1000–1250 words) and recorded/verbal evidence (between 5–6 minutes).

2) The group performance/design realisation (32 marks).
3) A monologue or duologue performance/design realisation (16 marks).

Component 2: Theatre Makers in Practice

  • Written examination: 1 hour 45 minutes
  • 40% of the qualification
  • 48 marks

Assessment overview
Section A: Live Theatre Evaluation

  • 16 marks.
  • Students answer one extended response question from a choice of two requiring them to analyse and evaluate a live theatre performance they have seen.
  • Students are allowed to bring in theatre evaluation notes of up to a maximum of 500 words.

Section B: Page to Stage: Realising a Performance Text

  • 32 marks.
  • Students answer two extended response questions on how they might interpret and realise an extract in performance. It will be an unseen extract from their chosen text.
  • Students answer from the perspective of a performer and a designer.
  • Performance texts are not allowed in the examination as extracts will be provided.

A2
Component 1: Devising

  • 40% of the qualification – 80 marks
  • Devise an original performance piece.
  • Use one key extract from a performance text and a theatre practitioner as stimuli
  • Performer or designer routes available. Assessment overview
  • Internally assessed and externally moderated.
  • There are two parts to the assessment: 1) a portfolio (60 marks, 40 marks)

Portfolio submission recommendations are:

-1) Can be handwritten/typed evidence between 2500–3000 words or recorded/verbal evidence between 12–14 minutes or can be a combination of handwritten/typed evidence (between 1250–1500 words) and recorded/verbal evidence (between 6–7 minutes).
2) The devised performance/design realisation (20 marks).

Component 2: Text in Performance Coursework

  • 20% of the qualification 60 marks
  • A group performance/design realisation of one key extract from a performance text.
  • A monologue or duologue performance/design realisation from one key extract from a different performance text.

Assessment overview

  • Externally assessed by a visiting examiner.
  • Group performance/design realisation: worth 36 marks.
  • Monologue or duologue/design realisation: worth 24 marks.

Component 3: Theatre Makers in Practice

  • Written examination: 2 hours 30 minutes
  • 40% of the qualification
  • 80 marks

Assessment overview
Section A:
Live Theatre Evaluation

  • 20 marks
  • Students answer one extended response question from a choice of two requiring them to analyse and evaluate a live theatre performance they have seen.
  • Students are allowed to bring in theatre evaluation notes of up to a maximum of 500 words.

Section B: Page to Stage: Realising a Performance Text

  • 36 marks
  • Students answer two extended response questions based on an unseen extract from the performance text they have studied.
  • Students will demonstrate how they, as theatre makers, intend to realise the extract in performance.
  • Students answer from the perspective of a performer and a designer.
  • Performance texts for this section are not allowed in the examination as the extracts will be provided.

Section C: Interpreting a Performance Text

  • 24 marks
  • Students will answer one extended response question from a choice of two based on an unseen named section from their chosen performance text
  • Students will demonstrate how their re-imagined production concept will communicate ideas to a contemporary audience.
  • Students will also need to outline how the work of their chosen theatre practitioner has influenced their overall production concept and demonstrate an awareness of the performance text in its original performance conditions.
  • Students must take in clean copies of their performance texts for this section, but no other printed materials.

SET TEXTS
List A – one from:

  • Performance text
  • Accidental Death Of An Anarchist, Dario Fo (adapted by Gavin Richards)
  • Colder Than Here, Laura Wade
  • Equus, Peter Shaffer
  • Fences, August Wilson
  • Machinal, Sophie Treadwell
  • That Face, Polly Stenham

&

List B – one from:

  • Performance text
  • Antigone, Sophocles (adapted by Don Taylor)
  • Doctor Faustus, Christopher Marlowe*
  • Hedda Gabler, Henrik Ibsen (adapted by Richard Eyre)
  • Lysistrata, Aristophanes (translated by Alan H. Sommerstein)
  • The Maids, Jean Genet (translated by Bernard Frechtman)
  • The School for Scandal, Richard Brinsley Sheridan
  • The Tempest, William Shakespeare
  • Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett
  • Woyzeck, Georg Bűchner (translated by John Mackendrick )
  • Edexcel as.pdf
  • Edexcel A2 Spec.pdf