This project began earlier this year as artists from Charnwood Arts were invited into Wreake Valley Youth Club to produce a video. The project started well, but eventually summer evenings began to get warmer and inevitably staying outside and tea round at the chip shop became a more alluring than stopping indoors, and slowly the membership of the Wednesday night youth club dwindled.

Jean Evans at Wreake Valley struck on an idea - why not hold the project as a summer holiday event? That way young people would be desperate for something to do. (As appealing as summer holidays are we all remember the feeling by week 3 of not wanting to go back but desperate for entertainment other than daytime TV!)

So, it was decided amongst Jean, the artists (Alan Cesarano, Faye Chamberlain, Amy Stirk, Jonno Marcus and Peter Baker) and the participants, that from July 18th through to 26th the video project would be under full time production.

Unfortunately, through no fault of their own, some of the young people’s parents decided this was the ideal time to go on holiday. Tantrums ensued but a week in Bognor won out. So we were left with a slightly depleted, but no less committed cast.

The week began with the group deciding on what type of video they wanted to produce. The theme settled upon was of a ‘postcard’ from Syston, based on a character from the Fast Show called Brilliant Boy. (“Ain’t Milk Brilliant”... etc). The video was to have two main characters - Freda, an elderly resident of Syston, and Helga, a young German tourist visiting her favourite area for the umpteenth time. The local resident would depict Syston in a very negative manner, whereas the tourist could see the town as something special - often the case when locals become blinkered to their surroundings and can only see it’s bad points.

The video was shot successfully in various locations around Syston, and the young cast, with little or no acting experience, coped tremendously with the odd looks they were given from people around the town as they paraded through in their costumes.

After the usual problems a production like this encounters, and a few unusual ones even George Lucas would be proud of, the video was a complete success. It even has it’s own original soundtrack, composed by the group along with Peter, who also produced the music.