tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31951023611608363422024-02-19T17:31:18.074-05:00The Fifth WallThere's another wall beyond the one between stage and audienceAaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.comBlogger287125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-63741483537400745422020-02-10T11:00:00.000-05:002020-02-10T13:28:01.369-05:00Review: Timon at TFANA<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Timon of Athens</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>director</b> Simon Godwin</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>company</b> Theater for a New Audience</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><i>Timon of Athens</i> is at the periphery of Shakespeare’s canon, a late-career collaboration with Thomas Middleton that reads like a rough draft. Its unfinished condition should make it a favorite of directors who like to stamp their visions on the classics. Yet <i>Timon</i> has only been staged twice in my 20+ years in NYC; it’s a treat just to glimpse it in the wild. </span></div>
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Besides, the subject is timely but timeless: avarice among the rich. Timon, a patrician in classical Athens, spends money charitably but recklessly until it runs out. Bankruptcy sends Timon into the wilderness as a vagrant; buried treasure is a stimulus for invective rather than redemption. Finally the self-exiled pauper supports a general’s assault on Athens and then expires with a curse. Thematically & tonally, the play is a forerunner of modernism, with its alienation & disillusion, and its visions of the corruptive nature of capital. Like other late plays by Shak, it experiments with allegory & parable at the expense of plot & psychology. </div>
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Simon Godwin, now in charge of the Shakespeare Theater Company in DC, directs this co-production between his company, the RSC, & TFANA. He’s cut & shaped the text considerably—sometimes radically—to make it stageworthy, but he & dramaturg Emily Burns have retained the character of Shak’s collab with Middleton. The staging is typical for more forward-looking companies, lively & modern. When soliloquies play in the foreground, the action upstage turns silent & slow-mo; three repetitious scenes of aristos snubbing Timon are collapsed into a montage. These devices heighten the play’s setpieces and render the underfleshed plot into compelling theater. </div>
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The major rewrite involves that general’s assault on Athens. In the original it’s an act of treachery, like Coriolanus’ march on Rome. In this staging it’s an insurgency, a mobilization of leftist protesters. Early in the play, the general says, in lines written by Godwin & Burns:</div>
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“The dispossessed without the city walls make their abode…<br />No roof, no comfort, no hope of citizenship<br />No home, no country, they have abandoned hope.” </blockquote>
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In this tragedy, Timon’s suffering and death is a sacrifice to the spirit of economic justice. </div>
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Almost incidentally, Timon and the general have been recast as women. It’s not to any thematic or theatrical effect, except the straightforward values of progressive casting. It gives a great actor, Kathryn Hunter, the chance to play a traditionally male role. The pronouns are changed but the part itself is sexless; Timon begins the play as a modern society matron, a thrower of dinner parties, and ends in filth & burlap. Hunter holds together the role & the show by force of personality. Her elfin face belies her remarkable presence, and her small stature contains the physical strength of a gymnast. By the fifth act, her reflections on human nature are filled with anguish, elevating the sense of tragedy to <i>Lear</i>-like proportions. </div>
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As with many of Shak’s plays, the first half of <i>Timon</i> is stronger than the second. The city of Athens is presented in Oriental minimalism: black outfits gilded with gold, a live klezmer band, a bare brass wall with an empty black entrance. The wasteland of the second half is austere, the stage covered in dirt, and the action more fable-like. This shift of tone pays off when three bandits show up, intending to steal Timon’s treasure. Instead they’re treated to a mournful lecture on the wealth, and moved to quit thieving forever. The conversion of these clods is original to Shak, and it sounds a strange note of redemption. It’s the diamond in this play’s rough, and TFANA’s <i>Timon</i> presents it without a flaw.</div>
</span>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-1789595076715941312017-12-13T11:00:00.000-05:002017-12-13T11:00:00.551-05:00Women on Shakespeare: Lee Sunday Evans on directing The Winter's Tale<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b><br />
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<b>Twice each season, the Public Theater's <a href="http://www.publictheater.org/en/Programs--Events/Mobile-Unit/" style="font-style: normal;">Mobile Unit</a> tours NYC neighborhoods with stagings of classic plays. This fall, the company is concluding its all-boro tour of <i>The Winter's Tale</i> with a brief run at its home on Lafayette Street. Lee Sunday Evans has directed the staging, her first work for the Mobile Unit. She spoke with me by phone to discuss the play and her production.</b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Had you read
or seen <i>Winter’s Tale</i> before you started
work on this production?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">You know, I don’t think I’d seen a production before.
I went to watch Declan Donnellan’s recent production from a few years ago [<a href="http://www.cheekbyjowl.com/the_winter's_tale.php" target="_blank">Cheek by Jowl</a> at BAM, 2016]. It
was very helpful and inspiring what he did the production.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But I had always
been attracted to the play because of the family story. I felt a personal
connection to what happened to Leontes, Hermione, and
Perdita. I also was drawn to the question of forgiveness and redemption, and
had a complicated relationship with the idea that these two women do come back to forgive the patriarch. I also find it enormously
powerful and I tend to be attracted to projects that unnerve me. The ending of this play definitely has that.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Can you
articulate what that challenge was and how you solved it?</b><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfMMIgPMMLe5-gI5jy68L-wiG5_CEVi0M0dKuhNcW8jTkIU2A4Lrwbx_mnG0W_npxBxvXDAusmPUq0RmBjztfETrGHUAJHIhvDkO8n2qFHQ5mkipqlnpnBDIrmbv9wDQIZkQW4d_N2Drk/s1600/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Mobile+Unit+%252717+-+photo+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1067" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfMMIgPMMLe5-gI5jy68L-wiG5_CEVi0M0dKuhNcW8jTkIU2A4Lrwbx_mnG0W_npxBxvXDAusmPUq0RmBjztfETrGHUAJHIhvDkO8n2qFHQ5mkipqlnpnBDIrmbv9wDQIZkQW4d_N2Drk/s320/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Mobile+Unit+%252717+-+photo+1.jpg" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The challenge is, do you take the audience on a
journey where they think that Leontes deserves forgiveness and redemption? We
did a performance on the road at the Mobile Unit. When Hermione comes back from
being a statue, somebody said, "Slap him!" I think there’s truth to that
[response]. I think the play doesn’t necessarily doesn’t give
enough voice to the harm he’s caused Hermione and Perdita. <i>Winter's Tale</i> draws on
some deep need that we all have to believe that forgiveness and redemption is possible, but we don’t see the nuts and bolts of how reconciliation happens. So one thing that became important to us
was that there’s this one moment where the statue has just come alive, and
Paulina says to Leontes, "Nay, present her your hand." It’s
this amazing textual clue, because it means both of them are standing there
frozen.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">They’re both
statues!<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Yeah! Paulina has to encourage him to reach out to her. Then there’s this beautiful non-verbal moment where you do watch
Leontes take his hand and reach out to Hermione. There’s a moment of great
suspense about when and how and in what way she reaches out to take his hand
in return. So I thought the actors did an
incredible job of being sensitive to that first moment of them
looking at each other once the statue has come to life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That silent moment contrasts with Hermione’s speech at the trial. How did you approach that scene, her other big opportunity to command the stage?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I cast
Stacey [Yen] because I knew she had a particular ferocity and a depth of heart and
feeling that she could bring to that moment. I knew it was important that
Hermione be able to feel love for the Leontes at the trial. But I also wanted
to push against the idea that Hermione is saint-like. There’s an idea in that trial
that she speaks formally, with a sense that a higher morality distances her
from the heat of the trial. I didn’t want that to be in our production.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">[Instead] the trial scene in our Mobile Unit production is essentially a battle
between the personal and the public. They’re at an
extremely powerful, public court, and they devolve into essentially a marital
argument in front of that body. So we looked in the scenework at
how they were both unable to maintain the formality that’s associated with the
court and high status. And we talked about how she’s not on trial for adultery, she’s on trial for treason. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We also made it a clear
moment that Hermione did not yet know that her baby had been sent to Bohemia to
be abandoned. So we wanted the moment in the trial when Leontes says, 'As your
brat has been cast out, without a father owning it.' That was Hermione learning
it, for the first time, in the midst of the trial.
It was an incredible discovery that informed the escalation of the trial.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">The play
has a lot of misogyny in it, or at least the character of Leontes does. </b><b>But if it’s a play about forgiveness, it’s a play about forgiving Leontes. </b><b>How did you and the actors wrestle with that?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We chose the idea that Leontes is a charming leader,
beloved by the Sicilia. He’s had a powerful marriage with Hermione, and they
have a more modern marriage of equals, the way we
think of contemporary political couples. So as he descends
into jealousy, this underbelly of sexism and misogyny was coming out of him. It
had always been in him but it had been latent, it was emerging out of this crisis
of faith in his wife. So we were talking at scenework about Leontes’ emotional
journey, about how the experience of jealousy unlocked that hatred of women, or unleashed it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Zooming out to look at the play on an allegorical level,
paternal anxiety is a sexist structure that our society is built on. So the
play is wrestling with how paternity anxiety can send you down a rabbit hole. I
don’t know that the play would happen if Hermione wasn’t nine months pregnant,
and about to have their next child. I think it really is about paternity
anxiety. When you think about the hierarchy of a kingdom, of passing the family
line down through the son, it had much greater stake in Leontes’ family that we
relate to in our contemporary world. But the question of sexism is in the play
in a more structural way than just what's legible on the surface.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Let's shift to your staging. How did the stripped-down, touring nature of the Mobile Unit shape your approach to <i>Winter's tale</i>?</b><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I love working in a stripped-down way, and I
love having to get to the essential elements that you
need to communicate the story. So I love working with the limitations that come with touring [this show] to venues that aren't built to house performances. So the music was important, and I knew Heather Christian would be able to [compose] music that would ‘lift’ the space, no matter where we were. I also decided
to use puppets in the production because they allowed us to bring a bit of theatrical
magic without lights and sound and the more elaborate scenic design that
you'd associate with theater.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In terms of actors’ performances, we talked a lot in rehearsal about being able to include the audience, even when you’re in a scene
with another character. And I watched the actors, over the course of the touring performances, learn how to speak to the audience directly. It’s enormously satisfying, dynamic, and rich, and it makes so much
sense of the text. It makes you feel connected to the way that
the plays were originally done, imagining the original actors talking back to
the audience. It also creates a sense of immediacy, in those rooms
when we’re on the road, that is incredibly fun and compelling.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">You mentioned the ‘slap him’ line;
were there any other vocal </b><b>responses that surprised you and the performers</b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">?<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd3zbu5Q-kcp-C5P_J0vT91_z_n0CePii4Ts6rLjjeMA9uq4y50qARH1D1RfrZIcmDks-Ta0lMh7FVcmhveL3Ph1vPMTCMSBspKLrQvLHrPrsX9eqyB85WFm780TDkfHzx4Q1hZP6kaOc/s1600/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Mobile+Unit+%252717+-+photo+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1167" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd3zbu5Q-kcp-C5P_J0vT91_z_n0CePii4Ts6rLjjeMA9uq4y50qARH1D1RfrZIcmDks-Ta0lMh7FVcmhveL3Ph1vPMTCMSBspKLrQvLHrPrsX9eqyB85WFm780TDkfHzx4Q1hZP6kaOc/s320/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Mobile+Unit+%252717+-+photo+3.jpg" width="233" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One thing I thought was incredible was how people responded to the derogatory language that Leontes uses.
When he calls Hermione a ‘flax wench’, he calls her a ‘bed-swerver’, he calls
her an "adulteress"—people would respond with shock and disbelief that he’d use
those words. It was amazing to hear that language get the kind of reactions you’d
think that language should get! It’s incredibly violent language, damning things
to say about his wife. But often when you sit in the theater and the lights are
down, and you’re in more practiced audience, people may have may have
that reaction internally, but they don’t share that reaction, it doesn’t become
a communal experience.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So the experience of being on the road was people
responding vocally to Leontes and the horror of what happens. That happened
with both men and women. I was at a performance at a homeless shelter for
women. During what we call the sleepless night scene, where Paulina brings the
baby in and lays it down before Leontes and says, 'this is your baby.' People
who were watching were echoing what Paulina was saying—“It’s your baby!” People responded to the stakes in a
way that was invigorating and inspiring to the actors.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I know you didn’t program
this yourself, but I’m curious to hear why you feel <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Winter’s Tale</i> is it the right play to revive this fall.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think it’s an incredible play, probably resonant at
many different times. Right now it’s relevant to be talking about leaders who
don’t have the ability to separate their personal feelings, their fits of rage,
from their leadership role. The way this play is about a nuclear family, but
that nuclear family is also the state, the political apparatus.
That’s very relevant.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then as we were doing the
production, the wave of women coming out and talking about sexual abuse that’s
happening—without us altering anything or doing anything directly related to that social moment, I think the question of “can this man be redeemed?” has a
different meaning. On a macro level, we’re wrestling with this question, “What
does it mean to have the truth come out?” and then what does it mean to have any
concept of forgiveness or reconciliation? I don’t know that we’re there yet with sexual abuse and harassment and rape.
But I think the play is interested in an indirect dialogue with that question
of forgiveness and redemption.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Could we hear a little about your experience with Shakespeare prior to <i>The Winter’s Tale</i>.</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Prior to <i>The Winter’s Tale</i> I did a production of <i>Macbeth</i>. It was an adaptation I did with three women playing the entire play. The idea was that the three witches were telling this ancient story about how the societal structure of power could corrupt an individual. I looked at that play as an origin story about the corrupting force of power. So that was my first professional Shakespeare production.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That was at Hudson Valley Shakespeare?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Yes. That piece also had me work with Heather Christian, and it was also very stripped down. It was done on a lighting installation, with no set and no props.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>And before that?</b><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I got exposed to textwork through <a href="https://www.bu.edu/cfa/profile/paula-langton/" target="_blank">Paula Langton</a>. She's a professor at Boston University who's affiliated with <a href="http://www.shakespeare.org/" target="_blank">Shakespeare and Company</a>, with Tina Packer. And working with Paula on the text was the thing that really gripped me about working on Shakespeare.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then there was a company that grew out of Shakespeare and Company, it popped up in Boston while I was there, called the </span><a href="http://www.actorsshakespeareproject.org/" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;" target="_blank">Actors Shakespeare Project</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. They did a production of </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Lear</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> that was absolutely riveting. Alvin Epstein played Lear, I think he might’ve been 80 years old. It was absolutely incredible, and that production really whetted my appetite to do Shakespeare.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Another Shakespeare production that had a big impact on me was [when] Declan Donnellan brought a production of <i><a href="http://archive.cheekbyjowl.com/twelfth-night-2/" target="_blank">Twelfth Night</a></i> with a company from Moscow. They did it in Russian at BAM [in 2006]. I absolutely loved that production. It was an incredible experience because you were reading the text as you were experiencing the performance. It was powerful to have access to the text, and at the same time the performances were so incredibly dynamic and clear they also transcended the language. It was really incredible.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Do you have any Shakespeare plays you’d love to
tackle? Any conceptual adaptations or radical versions in mind, </b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">like your three-woman <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Macbeth</i></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I would love to do <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">King
Lear</i>, and I would love to do <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Measure
for Measure</i>. Those two are high on my list. I don’t have a conceptual
approach to those plays or another play. But I had an amazing experience doing <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Macbeth</i> that way, we’ll see if there’s
another adventure of that nature down the road.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What is it
about <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Measure for Measure</i> that entices you?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some of the same questions as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Winter’s Tale</i>. The questions of sex and power and justice, of how the
system affects these individuals, and how these individuals interact with each
other, because of and in reaction to this system of their society. I love the
way the personal and political work in that play as well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I hope
you’ll get the opportunity to do your <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Measure
for Measure</i> so we can talk about it more. One last thing: do you have anything coming up
that we should know about?</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I’m doing a production of <i>[Porto]</i> by Kate Benson at the <a href="http://wptheater.org/" target="_blank">Women’s Project</a>. That runs from the
end of January through the beginning of March. Then I’m doing a production of <i>Dance Nation</i> by Clare Barron at <a href="https://www.playwrightshorizons.org/" target="_blank">Playwrights Horizons</a> later in the spring.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Thank you!</b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<b>The Public's Mobile Unit stages <i>The Winter's Tale</i> from Nov 26 to Dec 17 at the <a href="https://publictheater.org/" target="_blank">Public Theater</a> in the Village. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<b>headshot</b> Andrew Kluger<br />
<b>photos</b> Carol Rosegg</div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-60398901320558379632017-10-12T11:00:00.000-04:002017-10-12T14:11:47.359-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Jenny König on Lady Anne<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the third season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b>For New Yorkers, Thomas Ostermeier's regular visits to BAM showcase an especially radical approach to classic drama. His <i>Doll's House</i> in '04 had Nora shoot Torvald down like a horror-movie heroine! At the Berlin Schaubühne, <a href="https://www.schaubuehne.de/en/people/jenny-koenig.html" target="_blank">Jenny König</a> has worked on Shakespeare with Ostermeier several times, as Gertrude/Ophelia in <i>Hamlet</i> and Isabelle in <i>Measure for Measure</i>. Now she's visiting NYC in his <i>Richard III</i>, playing Lady Anne. She emailed with me about playing one of Shak's most challenging small roles.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with </b></span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Lady Anne. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating? What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></div>
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Fascinating for me is especially that this woman keeps going. She lost everything. She has no real opportunity for social acceptance or security and yet she talks to this man, the murderer of her husband, her father and her father-in-law, so in short the lone reason for her misery. And in the end she even gets engaged [to] him.</div>
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That conflict is exciting, but of course it is also a conflict that I also have to manage, playing this scene.</div>
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And then again it’s quite reasonable. Lady Anne is a woman living in times of great uncertainty, so the most important thing was to stay in a position of power. I think any man in her position wouldn’t have had the same difficulties, or at least not to this degree, because a man living in this times would always have had the possibility to live alone, start over or to switch sides. None of those things, a woman could have done by herself. Of course there are exceptions, like Queen Elizabeth, but they remain exceptions.</div>
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In addition to all this political reasoning there is an animalistic quality to the whole scene, even though Richard and Lady Anne are two very aristocratic persons. That’s a very exciting contrast as well.</div>
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<b>That scene is a classic and a challenging one. How do you make Anne's about-face plausible to the audience?</b></div>
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In my opinion her main motivation is not love, but political reasoning. For me, the engagement with Richard is above anything else an opportunity. It’s easy to forget what it meant for a woman to loose every man of her house, when all the words you have are those of a mourning widow calling upon the ghost of her ancestors, begging for revenge.</div>
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But it is very important to remember, that at the beginning of this scene Lady Anne has no security whatsoever. And even worse, her family fought at the losing side of the war. And now there is this man, how[ever] ugly he might be and how[ever] terrible the crimes he has committed may be, who is part of the winning family. And he comes to Lady Anne and surrenders himself completely to her. Not only emotionally, by saying he loves her and she is the purest most beautiful woman he knows, but also very literally by handing her a sword.</div>
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<b>What does Anne find appealing about Richard?</b></div>
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He gives her the thing she misses the most right now: power. That, at least for me is the reason she falls for his lies. And of course he is the forbidden fruit. That helps as well <span style="font-size: x-small;">😀</span></div>
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<b>What challenges have you found working on Shakespeare in translation?</b></div>
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To play a Shakespearean play in any language other than English naturally means to lose parts of the beauty of his writing and structure. But I think Marius von Mayenburg made a wise decision to mostly free himself from the verse-like structure of the language. He sometimes sacrifices the beauty of a well-written poem for the impact of the meaning of Shakespeare’s words.</div>
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I sometimes wish we had a translation of a Friedrich Schiller play. Because if the language of a play is so sophisticated and well placed there is always the danger of getting stuck in this golden cage of structured words.</div>
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<b>Turning to the play, what elements of <i>Richard III</i> feel urgent and contemporary?</b></div>
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Reading <i>Richard III</i>, you inevitably think about persons of today’s politics. Power and the people who possess power always seem to follow the same basic rules, same now as 400 years ago.</div>
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The loudest and most ruthless man claims to be the greatest victim and gets to be king.</div>
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Maybe that is why Shakespeare always seems to work.</div>
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<b>Thomas Ostermeier’s direction of classics, at least the ones we’ve seen in New York, strikes many audiences as iconoclastic. How does the approach and aesthetic of <i>Richard III</i> fit with other work you've done with him?</b></div>
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One thing that every Ostermeier-production of a Shakespeare-play I know has in common, is that we are very aware of the fact we are playing a theatrical piece, but at the same time, every situation in that theater piece is real. So for instance, the transition from one scene to another is very theatrical, one actor can play more than one part, and the audience gets addressed by the actors. It’s all a play. We know that and the audience is allowed to see it. But the situations these people are living are very real. We always try to make the audience recognize themselves in those situations.</div>
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So during the rehearsals for <i>Richard III</i>, we talked a lot about lying and manipulating we have experienced in our own lives, in order to get a better understanding of the scenes and the reasons these people make decisions. And we noticed that our private experiences are still quite close to what Shakespeare has written 400 years ago.</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women? Where are his strengths and his weaknesses?</b></div>
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One thing you can never change is that Shakespeare lived 400 years ago. So all the latest developments like feminism, emancipation, sexual revolution and the fight against the common reception of what it means to be beautiful, all this he never experienced. And so neither can the women that he wrote experience those things. But of course you try to tell the story of a “strong, modern woman”, a story that, sadly, is not written down in the play. How am I supposed to show Ophelia as a strong and independent woman, when she keeps repeating the words “I shall obey”? It sometimes feels like the more I try to think of her as a modern woman, the more I fight against the play and by doing so, I can’t really work as an actress.</div>
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A friend of mine, a male actor, once had to play a woman in a Shakespearean play. He came to me with the words “Holy shit, I never had to listen to directing instructions like this! How do you manage to play stuff like this?”</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">in <i>Measure for Measure</i></td></tr>
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But I think there also can be a strength in showing women the way Shakespeare saw them, because you sometimes get incredible reactions to this depicting of weakness. For instance, we played in Iran once, and after the show many women came to me asking why we had shown Ophelia as such a weak woman. "Why didn’t you show her the way we want to see her?" To which I could only reply: “Read the play, we only did what Shakespeare wrote down.” And like this we started to talk about women and the issues we face today. And that is, what for me theater is about: communication.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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Joan la Pucelle from <i>Henry VI</i> is one special character I‘m longing to play. Shakespeare has written her as witch, not as a fantastical, beautiful, evil woman. In his writing you can see his political issues with her. It’s not about her being female [as much as] which side she belongs to.</div>
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And of course every male main character is fascinating, but if I had to choose one of them I would go for King Lear. His philosophical thought, about mankind being “only” animals, I could imagine this is fun to play.</div>
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<b>Thanks!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><a href="https://www.bam.org/theater/2017/richard-iii" target="_blank">Richard III</a></i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Oct 12 to Oct 14 at BAM Harvey Theater </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in Fort Greene</span></b></span></b></span></span></span></span></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Tickets are $35-115!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b> Franzisca Sinn</span></div>
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</style>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-74406594788875661212017-10-09T11:00:00.000-04:002017-10-10T11:02:52.186-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Helen Cespedes on Rosalind<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the third season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF9u5b_htEUKiLqFYW8lcSmWL1JrqinGPc1nOjoue60Blq-GtVGtmsHQ1GeK03W6HhfHCa9yjin1UKyUCY2tvR18TJluySiEmxPgGyz3PcpYzOrne1yS11Ah-1igWZYHSvh5VoiZJXt-I/s1600/AYLI+-+Baruch+%252717+-+headshot+%2528Ros%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1067" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF9u5b_htEUKiLqFYW8lcSmWL1JrqinGPc1nOjoue60Blq-GtVGtmsHQ1GeK03W6HhfHCa9yjin1UKyUCY2tvR18TJluySiEmxPgGyz3PcpYzOrne1yS11Ah-1igWZYHSvh5VoiZJXt-I/s320/AYLI+-+Baruch+%252717+-+headshot+%2528Ros%2529.jpg" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>This autumn, director Jessica Bauman explores what <i>As You Like It</i> says about exile and refugees, in her retitled <i>Arden/Everywhere</i>. </b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>I'll have an interview with her next week, but meanwhile, I emailed with the production's Rosalind, </b></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.helencespedes.com/" target="_blank">Helen Cespedes</a>. Ms. Cespedes, a recent Juilliard grad, played a delightful Lady Teazle in Red Bull's <i>School for Scandal</i> last season, holding her own opposite veterans Dana Ivey and Frances Barber.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Rosalind. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I should start by saying that I somehow managed to go through drama school and my professional career so far never seeing or really reading <i>As You Like It</i>. I know! Crazy! But kind of an amazing treat to approach such an iconic role/play without the baggage of other performances and productions in my head. So, as I began reading and investigating the role and the story, I was struck by Rosalind’s aggressiveness. She goes from the heartbreak and paralysis of her father’s banishment and then her own to becoming really activated, once in man’s clothing.</span></div>
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Then I wondered: why does she do what she does? Why doesn’t she go find her father as soon as she gets to Arden? Why does she manipulate Orlando for three quarters of the play? And, when she does find her father (she mentions “I met with the Duke yesterday and had much question with him”) why does she not reveal herself to both him and Orlando? These are questions I imagine every production of this play has wrestled with.</div>
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<b>How did you and Jessica answer those questions?</b></div>
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In some ways, our lens into the play (imagining Arden as the land of displaced people where exiles and refugees find shelter) helps. The stakes of banishment are real. She truly does think she will be safer disguised as a man. There are actual accounts of refugee women disguising themselves as men in order to be safer from sexual assault. Furthermore, her father left her behind. Perhaps she has conflicted feelings about him. Perhaps she feels abandoned by him, or that he put his cause before his family. This would complicate an easy reunion. It can also explain the need to hide behind her disguise with Orlando and put his devotion to the test. She is looking for someone she can rely on. Of course, the one person she can truly rely on has been there the whole time: Celia, her cousin and best friend through it all.</div>
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<b>How does she view and deal with the world that Shakespeare imagines her into?</b><br />
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When she decides to disguise herself as a man, Rosalind says,</div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“…and in my heart,</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We’ll have a swashing and a martial outside.”</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I see this as a sort of hardening of her character. She is going to cover up what is vulnerable in herself in order to survive. But with this comes empowerment. As a man in this society, she gets to hold forth a lot more and act as an authority on other people’s business.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmW-ZX8X9_dQw9ANwJ0RMIQO95BHYTJmzaeVuha9Sq2ZopNy_C79WhRaTtjDCmsDpCTikcKe26kTZL9MziX2n8MviyOcQjOED3xsBH6dAZEH8kES2IFxnMc-CW0bsei8UQHEce17XDxYg/s1600/AYLI+-+Baruch+%252717+-+photo+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1069" data-original-width="1600" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmW-ZX8X9_dQw9ANwJ0RMIQO95BHYTJmzaeVuha9Sq2ZopNy_C79WhRaTtjDCmsDpCTikcKe26kTZL9MziX2n8MviyOcQjOED3xsBH6dAZEH8kES2IFxnMc-CW0bsei8UQHEce17XDxYg/s320/AYLI+-+Baruch+%252717+-+photo+1.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The stress of Rosalind’s situation also leads her to be quite prickly and hypocritical. I love this about her. It feels very human that she is flawed and lashes out and tests the boundaries of how insufferable she can be before people won’t put up with it anymore. For example, she berates Phoebe for not immediately accepting Silvius’ love, but then uses some of Phoebe’s own tactics/arguments on Orlando, testing the boundaries of his affection.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Rosalind is one of a type—Shakespeare’s adventurous, crossdressing ingénues. What sets her apart from her sisters in Shakespeare?</b></span></div>
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As I said, I wasn’t that familiar with this play until working on this production—maybe because I’m not tall (we’ve cut Rosalind’s “I am more than uncommon tall”) I didn’t think I’d play the role and didn’t look at it that closely — but, I have played Viola, another great “pants” role. These two women undergo similar trials — geographical displacement that leads them to dress as men to protect themselves — but they handle this transformation very differently. Viola moves through Illyria like a raw nerve; she is in love with Orsino and Olivia is in love with her, and Viola in turn is wholly reactive to these eccentric outside forces.</div>
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Meanwhile, Rosalind seems to me to be totally activated by her transformation. As Ganymede, she starts to call all the shots: purchasing food and shelter for herself, Celia, and Touchstone in Arden, manipulating Orlando, micromanaging Phebe and Silvius.… She is acting on the forces around her rather than reacting to them.</div>
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<b>What does she share with roles like Portia, Viola, and Imogen?</b></div>
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I think, in both Viola and Rosalind (and probably in Portia too, not so much in Imogen), presenting themselves to the world as a man allows them special access to society. Suddenly, people listen to them more and care what they have to say. In Rosalind’s case, she is all too happy to impart her wit and wisdom.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQrTT8HBwsXG23Rx31NUvy6GfUd-nH825TCGdg0QExV2adYIn544YCyALibZDQ0heNVHwjkGmhBnezG0KZ4dNdQSrr2xYHh2DrHWvYTtVZ4SuuBNduRZGSdYS9e9bo8V1C9Ra_DiPl7Ek/s1600/AYLI+-+Baruch+%252717+-+photo+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="796" data-original-width="1191" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQrTT8HBwsXG23Rx31NUvy6GfUd-nH825TCGdg0QExV2adYIn544YCyALibZDQ0heNVHwjkGmhBnezG0KZ4dNdQSrr2xYHh2DrHWvYTtVZ4SuuBNduRZGSdYS9e9bo8V1C9Ra_DiPl7Ek/s320/AYLI+-+Baruch+%252717+-+photo+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<b>Especially in the comedies, an actor gets to play with Elizabethan wit, love poetry and even clowning. How do you handle that range of styles onstage?</b></div>
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Yes, Rosalind does get to show all of these colors and it is glorious… actually, it’s just human and how human beings behave (perhaps not quite as articulately). Often, roles for women can be reduced to archetypes: the virgin and the funny one (or some variation on that). But human beings are clowns, lovers, intellectuals, heros, and villains all at once. I feel like Shakespeare has realized this scope and breadth more in Rosalind than any of his other female characters.</div>
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As an actor, I am a kid in a candy store (to use an archetype). Scripts that require all of my brain and all of my heart are exactly what I trained for. Shakespeare’s characters use wit as their currency. It is how they challenge each other, seduce each other, fall in love with each other etc. I had one teacher at Juilliard describe a battle of wits as a card game: if your scene partner uses one word, they have played that card, now you match that card and play another, and so on and so on as you top each other and see who wins. It’s a lot of fun. If only I could be half as clever as any of Shakespeare’s characters in my own life!</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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Overall, I think Shakespeare wrote women better than most contemporary plays do. We don’t allow female characters to be as contradictory as we used to. Even the screwball comedies of the '30s allowed women to turn from tragedy to comedy on a dime. That said, Shakespeare’s women are operating in societies where the constraints on women are much more obvious and visible. But Shakespeare has them pushing up against these boundaries.</div>
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There is strength and intellect in many of the female Shakespeare characters who are often depicted as wilting flowers. For example, I recently auditioned to play Ophelia. I had never really investigated that role before, and at first I thought, “ugh what a thankless role: you cry, you sing sad songs while vaguely twitching with madness, and then you die.”</div>
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But then I dug into the text… no, no, she is brilliant and activated. She is constrained by the rules of society and the men who get to make choices in her life, but she navigates that with great vitality. I think many directors/actors read the “O what a noble mind is here o’erthrown speech” and just play the “woe is me” part, as opposed to investing in the comparison she is making between Hamlet before and Hamlet now. Her best friend and boyfriend has transformed from a poised, brilliant young prince into a rambling, self-destructive, recluse. I didn’t get the part, but I’d love to play it one day!</div>
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Overall, I would say that Shakespeare usually gives his female characters the moral high ground, which, one could argue, is a form of misogyny. Don’t make us saints, make us human beings! I suppose that’s one of the reasons I like Rosalind so much. She is not a saint.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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I’d love to play Henry V, and go one that journey from frat boy to leader. To add the list of morally flawed women: I’d love to play Queen Margaret and/or Lady M. I played the Nurse in Drama School, but I’d love to play Juliet (if it’s not too late!). Gosh, all of them. There is so much to be mined in all of them.</div>
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<b>Any Shakespeare coming up?</b></div>
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I’m going to play Viola again this spring in a production at Theater For a New Audience directed by Maria Aitken. It will be a wonderful to play both cross-dressing heroines in the matter of a few months.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Arden/Everywhere</i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Oct 8 to Oct 28 at Baruch College </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in Gramercy Park</span></b></span></b></span></span></span></span></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Student tickets are $16, general admission $36!</b></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">photos</b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> Russ Rowland</span></div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-24221621104873515522017-09-21T11:00:00.000-04:002017-09-22T09:43:42.339-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Megan Bones on Lady Macbeth<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! We're wrapping up the second season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Megan Bones is one of three actors in Dzieci Theatre's <i>Makbet</i>. This radical staging invites the audience into a shipping container, where gypsies (or more properly, Romani) mount a wild, ritualistic version of Shakespeare's tragedy. </b><b>Incidentally, t</b><b>he venue is managed by <a href="http://www.surewecan.org/" target="_blank">Sure We Can</a>, a recycling center in Bushwick that provides a safe space for plastic & metal collectors to redeem their salvage, and encourage the arts and sustainable urban culture.</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Let’s start with your 3-actor <i>Macbeth</i>. What have been the practical challenges in staging this epic drama with such a small cast?</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">For Dzieci Theatre’s production of </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Makbet</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. I really have to be on my toes the whole time. Knowing all of the lines and being able to jump from character to character requires a specific demand, but that is the easy part. The true challenge for all of us is to be present to the moment at all times.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">How has the play been reshaped to accommodate three actors?</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In order to accommodate three actors, we altered the text quite a bit. For example, some of the minor characters and plot points have been cut from the play, a few minor characters have been blended together into one character, and some significant plot-related lines have been redistributed to a character who doesn’t normally say the line. We also cut huge portions of the dialogue to reveal the “essence” of each scene.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">What roles do you play?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The actors in our <i>Makbet</i> have learned the entire text and we switch from character to character throughout the evening. We use specific props to signify each character. It is highly improvisational, so I never know at the top of the show when I will be a certain character. [But] each night I play every major character at least once (Makbet, Lady Makbet, a weird sister, and Macduff). I often play many of the supporting roles as well (King Duncan, Malcom, Lady Macduff, and a handful of messengers).</span></div>
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<b>What challenges stem from this approach to performing?</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">While it is challenging to shift from character at the drop of a hat (literally), that is what makes it so fresh. The ever-changing nature of this production allows for different aspects of the characters, the play itself, my fellow actors, and myself to be highlighted and to unfold on an ongoing basis. It is transformative and thrilling and the play just gets richer and richer. I love how surprising it is every night. I love it when the cast is so attuned to one another and the whole thing just “clicks”. While it can be a wild ride at times, the simple, quite, honest moments, stand out the most, especially when the choice made by the actors is contrary to how one would stereotypically play that scene. A hushed battle scene can be so remarkable! But these favorite moments stem from an effort by the entire cast to approach each moment with honesty and to not fall into our habitual responses, or to forcefully try to repeat something that worked so well the last time. This work is the most challenging aspect of this production.</span><br />
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<b>You get to play Macbeth! What insights have you gained about the character?</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Makbet gets caught up in forces that seem beyond his control. He </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">doesn’t realize until “what’s done is done”, that he had ever had the </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">power of choice. But, haven’t we all been swept away or manipulated </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">by something or someone that led us to take actions contrary to our </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">perceived nature? Given the right circumstance, we are all capable of </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">his deeds. The qualities these characters posses are in our DNA as </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">humans. We are all Makbet. We are all Lady Makbet. I, too, could be </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">swayed by the desire for power for wealth. I, too, could be capable </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">of murder. So could you. So could any of us. That’s super </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">interesting to me.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">How has your social identity as a woman affected your approach to the role?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The fact that I am a women cannot be ignored and it is going to color everything that I do in </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Makbet</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. However, in approaching the role of Makbet, or in any role, my focus is less on my identity as a women, and more on what makes these characters universal. In this, I am not attempting to play “myself”, but I am using myself as a resource. If I try to “act like a man”, or if I am worried about being a women while playing a man, it feels and reads false. Any stereotypical behavior divides us from a deeper involvement to the mystery of human behavior. Instead, I focus on the actions of the character and his/her relationship with other characters. That’s something I can truthfully perform.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">You’ve worked as a core member of the Dzieci ensemble for almost a decade now. What sets this company’s approach apart from more conventional <i>Macbeths</i>?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In every piece we do, we try to create a community. </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Makbet</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> is no exception. When you arrive on the scene, you are immediately greeted as if you were a family member. We give you vodka, we give you kielbasa, we sing to you as we hang out by the fire.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But there are a few subtle things going on that also aid in creating this community. In each of our pieces have a “character/archetype” that is actually intended to provide a gulf between the audience and the performer. The characters we portray are outsiders. In the pre-show, the cast, already in this character, essentially says, “Here I am!” It is the job of the audience member to meet us, accept us and bridge that gap.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Who are those outsider characters?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Makbet</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, we are a clan from the “Old Country” This clan is a performing a ritual. We take on the characters in </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Makbet</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> and carry out the violence, revenge, betrayal, etc in order to purge these aspects from our community. The way the ritual is performed — three actors, switching roles, led by a chorus inside a shipping container — lends itself to the most unique </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Makbet</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> you will ever see!</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women? Where are his strengths in depicting them and where are his weaknesses? Is there anything in his plays that’s beyond salvaging?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">With regard to women in Shakespeare, I think all of his plays are worth investigating. Sure, some may say that his women are not portrayed in the most positive light, but he was writing at such a different time. I don’t fault him for that. These characters are still deeply compelling. Shakespeare is such a master at writing to the human experience. If you take away the character name, and just read the lines… we have all experienced and felt what he writes about. It is what makes us the same, rather than what makes us different, that is appealing to me.</span></div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></span></div>
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Hamlet!</div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://dziecitheatre.org/" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Dzieci</span> Theatre</a>'s <i>Makbet</i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Sept 6 to Oct 8 at Sure We Can </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in Bushwick</span></b></span></b></span></span></span></span></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Tickets are $20!</b></div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-53165213386150548102017-08-07T11:00:00.000-04:002017-08-07T14:08:28.620-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Jenny Strassburg on Lady Macbeth<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! We're wrapping up the second season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Firmly rooted by two decades of producing outdoor Shakespeare, the NY Classical Theatre stands out for its theatrically environmental stagings, which keep audiences on the move in Manhattan parks. In her debut with the company, Jenny Strassburg takes on Lady Macbeth. She emailed with me about the role, and about Shakespeare generally.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Lady Macbeth. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></span></div>
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I love that Lady M will change on a dime to get what she wants — the crown that she feels her husband deserves. For me, the most challenging scene is probably the incantation. It’s taken me a while to feel my way through that one, i.e. trying to find the truth of it. But after doing some research, I realized that this moment, and all of the supernatural moments in <i>Macbeth</i>, are akin to our modern-day special effects and therefore have a heightened theatricality. And really, Lady M herself has a heightened theatricality as well. She’s dynamic and dramatic. Once you can embrace that, it’s really fun to do as an actor.</div>
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There are lots of knots in Macbeth — the one I find most fascinating is the idea to murder Duncan. It’s not explicit in the script. In rehearsal, we were trying to figure out whose idea it was — Lady M’s or Macbeth’s. You literally have to read between the lines, and what we discovered is that it is an idea that they hatch together, almost without words. The Macbeth’s are so in tune with one another that they have the same thoughts at the same time, finishing each other’s sentences. They are the original power couple.</div>
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<b>Who is she, independent of her husband? What drives her to commit murder?</b></div>
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When we first see Lady M, she is reading a letter where Macbeth tells her about his meeting with the witches and what they have forecast for him. If she had never received the letter, I believe that she and her husband would have gone on happily living together, very much in love. But she receives the letter and is then told that Duncan is coming to her house, which seems like Fate to her. And when Macbeth arrives the two of them start to plan.</div>
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She seems so incredibly strong and ambitious, the stronger of the two really, and it’s very interesting to me that when she realizes she has lost her husband in the banquet scene, she starts to lose her own grip on reality. So, in the end, being independent of her husband is so painful that she cannot go on living. And that pain is what drives her to suicide — and while she plots the death of Duncan, her own murder is the only one she actually commits.</div>
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<b>How do you approach her mad scenes, and play them honestly? What, in your mind, links them to the sane woman earlier in the play?</b></div>
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I actually really like getting to play the mad scene. It is a totally different side of Lady M that we haven’t seen up to this point in the play. She is very vulnerable, and even has moments of returning to her childhood. Our director, Stephen Burdman, was incredibly helpful in crafting this scene. He told me that in order to play mad, you have to commit to each moment fully and then change on a dime. Shakespeare has written very clear beats in this scene, so that the actor knows when and where Lady M is in her head from moment to moment. There are actually very clear links to earlier moments in the play — she repeats some of the same lines, or a version of them, so that you know exactly what moments she is revisiting and trying to resolve.</div>
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<b>What does Lady M share with similar roles in Shakespeare, like Cleopatra, Lear’s daughters, and Queen Margaret?</b></div>
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Like Cleopatra, she feels she is fated for greatness, and like Cleopatra the pain of living without her love is too much, so to end her suffering she takes her own life. It’s interesting to think about her similarities to Goneril and Regan, who are trying to take the control of the kingdom from their aging father. Duncan is not senile — but his kingdom is in turmoil. There is no doubt in my mind that Lady M thinks Macbeth would be a better king. He is the nation’s best general, and in order to get there he must have inspired great loyalty, love, and respect in his men, making him an excellent and natural leader. Lady M and Lear’s daughters are overthrowing the present rule for something they think will be better — themselves. Queen Margaret is frustrated with her husband for his weakness and his inability to rise to the occasion, and Lady M certainly experiences that frustration with Macbeth’s vacillations and inability to leave the past behind once he is king.</div>
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<b>What sets her apart from those women?</b></div>
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Well, she is strong and ambitious in a way that is threatening to society. She is unabashed about what she wants. And it’s amazing to me that the reaction that Shakespeare’s audience had to Lady M is probably going to be the same for many people in a modern audience. Women like this are dangerous — they don’t accept societal norms and refuse to be boxed in. She goes for the jugular in a way that I don’t think any of his other women do, so that it’s easy to see her as a villain — she is referred to as the “fiend-like queen”. But, of course, I do not see her this way. She loves her husband passionately and wants the crown for him. That she gets to be queen is secondary.</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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His roles for women are fantastic. They are interesting, complex, and usually very strong. There are nowhere near as many female roles as men, so the women that are in the plays are going to be very compelling and integral to the story. Even the less assertive female characters have a strength of conviction and nobility. He was writing women that had to be played by men, but the words feel very natural coming out of a woman’s mouth, which I think speaks to Shakespeare’s genius. To date, I haven’t really found any weaknesses. Perhaps only that I wish there more women in the plays :). And to me, there is nothing in Shakespeare that requires salvaging. Even a moment that seem unfinished or disjointed is always there for the a reason — and it is up to the actor to discover why it is there. </div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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I’d love to play Cleopatra or Imogen. I have a child and I’d love to see a woman play King Lear — it would be fascinating to see to how making Lear into a mother would inform the relationship with the daughters. Also, Hotspur, just because he’s awesome.</div>
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<b>Thank you for your time, and break a leg!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.newyorkclassical.org/" target="_blank">NY Classical Theatre</a>'s <i>Macbeth</i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Jul 30 to Aug 20 </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in Battery Park in lower Manhattan, and from Aug 22 to 29 in Brooklyn Bridge Park across the river</span></b></span></b></span></span></span></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-45807207096491406862017-07-27T11:00:00.000-04:002017-07-27T11:00:03.362-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Jane Bradley on directing Twelfth Night<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>In just a few seasons, <a href="https://www.jane-bradley.com/" target="_blank">Jane Bradley</a> has become a high-profile member of the Drilling Company. A strong turn as <i>Othello</i>'s Emilia led to her playing Rosalind in the Parking Lot one summer and Portia the next. This season, she takes on the director's role, staging <i>Twelfth Night</i> this weekend only in Bryant Park. Ms. Bradley took time from her work to email me about it.</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Let’s start with <i>Twelfth Night</i>. What were your impressions of the show as you began this project?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I was originally drawn to <i>Twelfth Night</i> because I love its anarchic spirit. The nobility behave like soap opera characters, the court is overrun with fools and clowns, and at the center of it all, this bright, rational young woman from a foreign land is trying to fit in and stay alive. It’s a brilliant take on the classic “fish out of water” story that allows us to see the wacky wonderland of Illyria through Viola’s eyes.</span></div>
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<b>What have you discovered about the play that you find fascinating? </b></div>
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I think a lot of people approach <i>Twelfth Night</i> with preconceived notions, because it’s a play that’s so well known and loved. I wanted to avoid the trap of passing this sort of judgment on the characters, and instead take the time to discover who they really are. We avoided questions like, “Are the revelers too cruel to Malvolio?” and, “How is it possible for Viola, Olivia and Orsino to fall in love so quickly?” and instead focused on the circumstances of each scene. What we discovered is that, while the stakes in this play are ridiculously high, nobody’s behavior is unrelatable. Maria, Toby and Fabian take a practical joke too far and end up hurting somebody — it happens. Olivia is bored and lonely and falls head-over-heels for a handsome, witty stranger — it happens. When we looked at each of the scenes objectively, we realized that the characters are just doing what people do under extreme circumstances.</div>
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<b>Why is it the right play to stage this summer in NYC?</b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">as Rosalind in <i>As You Like It</i><br />
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There are lyrics that Feste sings in this play that I keep thinking about, in terms of why it’s so important to stage plays like <i>Twelfth Night</i> right now: “Present mirth hath present laughter; what’s to come is still unsure.” It’s a tumultuous time in the world, and I think we’re all very aware of the fragility and impermanence of everything. Now, perhaps more than ever, people need to laugh. Shakespeare gives us permission to feel good for an hour or two, while acknowledging that everything ahead of us is unknown.</div>
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<b>How</b><b> does that influence your staging of Illyria</b><b>?</b></div>
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I embraced the escapist nature of the play to create a sort of mini-holiday for the audience. The color palette is bright and festive, the music is tuneful and sweet, and the jokes abound. The setting of the play is “nowhere now,” because I think everybody could use a little break from the here and now, you know?</div>
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<b>What’s your perspective on Viola’s disguise in the play?</b></div>
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Viola is one of Shakespeare’s greatest breeches roles. By disguising herself as a gentleman, she gains access to a level of security that she wouldn’t be able to acquire as a young woman in a foreign land. She’s strong, resourceful and clever, and uses her disguise to gain the favor of the Duke. You could interpret her behavior as an expression of her deep love for him, but I think there’s a more practical, self-preserving element to it, too. Orsino tells Viola that if she succeeds in what he asks her to do, “…thou shalt live as freely as thy lord, to call his fortunes thine.” Through taking advantage of her disguise, Viola has opportunity to start a whole new life for herself, following great personal tragedy. I think that would be incentive for anybody.</div>
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<b>What about Olivia’s role as a countess, a lover, and an object of desire?</b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">as Portia in <i>Merchant of Venice</i><br />
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Olivia, in my opinion, is a very modern character — one of those Shakespearean inventions that makes you wonder whether the playwright might have been an alien/time traveler (I’m not ruling it out). Her life is a dichotomy of power and oppression. She is a countess and the head of her household, but there is immense pressure on her to marry a suitor. She’s been sheltered and coddled all her life, and all she wants is for someone to challenge her. Viola sparks Olivia’s inner passion and rebelliousness, and allows her to achieve her full potential as a proactive, amorous individual. Her transformation in this play is totally delightful.</div>
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<b>How do you address the challenges of outdoor Shakespeare — especially one in a busy urban environment?</b></div>
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One of the joys and idiosyncrasies of The Drilling Company is that all of our productions are staged in busy urban environments — rather than resisting, we choose to embrace the chaos of New York City. Like all TDC productions, this <i>Twelfth Night</i> is high-energy, interactive theater that demands the audience’s engagement, rather than politely asking for it.</div>
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<b>How has the venue, Bryant Park, shaped your vision of the play?</b></div>
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What’s unique about Bryant Park is the size and grandeur of the stage — a bit of a shift from the parking lot! This is another reason that I chose such a dazzling color palette for our production and welcomed the opportunity for beautiful original music (written and performed by company member Andrew Gombas) — I wanted to ensure that we took advantage of the opportunity to present a real spectacle.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">as Emilia in <i>Othello</i><br />
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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The brilliant theater maker and actress Harriet Walter wrote <a href="https://www.thestage.co.uk/opinion/2016/harriet-walter-an-open-letter-to-shakespeare/" target="_blank">an open letter to Shakespeare</a> in The Stage last year that answers this question more eloquently than I ever could. I encourage everyone to read it.</div>
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Shakespeare has so many wonderful female characters (Viola, Olivia, Rosalind, Beatrice, etc.), but they’re constrained to defining themselves as they relate to the men in their lives. As Dame Walter points out, no scenes with Shakespeare’s women pass the Bechdel Test. Meanwhile, the male protagonists get to wrestle with all of the big stuff: mortality, violence, power. I’m so grateful to Shakespeare for giving us the female characters he did, but I do wish he’d come back and write us some new ones who are a little more woke (just saying: if he is a time traveler or an alien…).</div>
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<b>Do you have a short-list of Shakespearean plays you’d love to direct?</b></div>
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I’d love to direct any of the greatest hits, comedy or tragedy: <i>Hamlet</i>, <i>Much Ado</i>, <i>Midsummer</i>, The Scottish Play, to name a few. I enjoy the exercise of approaching plays I think I know well from a directorial standpoint, and having all of my original thoughts turned completely on their heads — keeps me humble. I’m also a sucker for site-specific theater in non-theatrical spaces, so maybe a <i>Tempest</i> at a public pool, or a <i>Comedy of Errors</i> in a dive bar — who knows!</div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.drillingcompany.org/" target="_blank">The Drilling Company</a>'s <i>Twelfth Night</i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Jul 28 to 30 </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in Bryant Park in midtown Manhattan</span></b></span></b></span></span></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>photo 1 & 2</b> Lee Wexler/Images for Innovation</span><br />
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-55328822652401391202017-07-20T11:00:00.000-04:002017-07-20T11:00:49.956-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Anwen Darcy on Helena (All's Well…)<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Anwen Darcy impressed me a great deal last summer, first in our <a href="http://the-fifth-wall.blogspot.com/2016/05/women-on-shakespeare-anwen-darcy-as.html" target="_blank">conversation about Beatrice</a> and then in performance in <i>Much Ado About Nothing</i>. Evidently she's also impressed the Drilling Company, since this is her third season with that prolific outdoor troupe. Directed by Karla Hendrick (<a href="http://the-fifth-wall.blogspot.com/2017/07/women-on-shakespeare-karla-hendrick-on.html" target="_blank">who spoke with me on Monday</a>), Anwen plays Helena, the heroine of </b></span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><i>All's Well That Ends Well</i></b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">, and I'm thrilled to talk with her again.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Helena. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">One of the most fascinating things about playing her is her constant hopefulness — the sheer joy and belief she has in her relationship with Bertram and the fact that they are meant to be together. There is a very strong religious streak in Helena, and her relationship to God is the foundation of all her plans. She believes He has put her on Earth to be with Bertram, and every time a plot of hers fails, she goes back to her faith, and that's been a lifesaver to have, really.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>In what way?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">When dealing with a situation like the bed trick, you can't frame it in a modern viewpoint. It's only really the past thirty years when that's become an unacceptable plot device (they use it in <i>Revenge of the Nerds</i>, for goodness sake). But giving her a moral reason for doing something unseemly really helped that moment take root in my mind. She's a little like Joan of Arc, in some ways. She has been given a mission and she will not fail.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Which scenes are the most challenging?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I think the hardest scene, for me, is such a little one but it's so important — it's the scene after the wedding, where she asks Bertram to kiss her, and he rejects her. It's a tiny tiny scene — it's maybe two or three pages — but it's humiliating. It's a lot of things — the fact that she can't talk to Bertram alone (Parolles stays onstage, and in our version is silently communicating with Bertram), that she's finally plucking up the courage to ask for something she's wanted for years <i>on top</i> of apologizing to him for surprising him with the wedding — it's just hard. It's a terrible mix of hope and utter ruin. Every night I secretly hope that Bertram isn't going to let her down, and every night he does. I've found that being exposed onstage is hideously uncomfortable for me (as it should be!) but that scene sends chills down my spine every night.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The biggest knot, I think to modern audiences, is the bed trick. How do you get around the lack of consent? Helena certainly has a lot of mental gymnastics in defining it to herself — her justification is that, because she is preventing him from sinning with Diana, and he is instead consummating his marriage to her, it's not a sin at all:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><i>… wicked meaning in a lawful deed,</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><i>And lawful meaning in a lawful fact,</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><i>Where both not sin, and yet a sinful fact.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">So working the audience through something that would very rightly be called rape, and having you come out on Helena's side, has been difficult.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>How do you feel about the choices she makes in the play?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The choice to love Bertram, above all, is I think the choice Helena is actively making the entire show. She never stops loving him — even after she gives him up, even after she finds out he's wooing someone else, even after he shows no real remorse she is dead. She is constantly choosing love and devotion, and I think that is what her heart is truly made of. She wants what's best for everyone — herself included, of course, but you see in the show that her happiness above all others is no happiness at all to her. She wants the world to be settled and happy.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">How do you see Helena's role in the play’s action?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What is interesting about Helena is how proactive she is without driving the scenes in the first half of the show. Helena never drives a scene until she confesses who she is to the Widow in Act 3, Sc. 7. Before that, she is very much an outsider allowing people to talk around her, before confessing her feelings to the audience in soliloquy. But you see, in the first scene, that nothing gets past her. She's sobbing because Bertram's leaving and is adrift in her own misery, but she's still listening, still hears LaFew talk about the King's disease, and by the end of scene 1 in the show, she's figured out a plan. She's going to go to the King, and solve his problem, and in her words, <i>"Who ever strove to show her merit that did miss her love?"</i> It's a really beautiful plan, in a lot of ways, because it very neatly solves her status issues, which she believes are the only thing getting in the way of her being with Bertram.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>What about subsequently?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Throughout the show, you see Helena setting up dominoes to fall, cutting paths to lead herself to Bertram, and finding out it's more difficult than she believes. So she is the engine of the whole show, but again, doesn't drive the action until the back half — it's the Countess and the King and Bertram who make decisions for her in the beginning. The Countess agrees to let her go to Paris, The King agrees to let her try her physic and gives her leave to marry Bertram. Bertram leaves instead of staying and working on the marriage. Acts 1-3 are really constant up and down that is simultaneously Helena's doing (she engineered all the situations) and her reacting to the decisions of those higher up (the King, Bertram, the Countess). It's only when she leaves France, when she leaves her marriage and agrees to lose everything, that we see her come into her own.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Last summer, you remarked that Shakespeare’s biggest flaw regarding female roles is that “once an intelligent, complicated woman has served her purpose, she stops talking.” Does Helena fit that dramaturgical pattern?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Helena <i>does</i> fit into that pattern. The more she becomes self-actualized, the less we see of her. We don't really know how she feels after that night with Bertram. She never tells us. The soliloquies inviting us into her headspace are gone. She's silent on what it felt like to have the man you've adored since childhood finally come to you as a husband but think you are someone else. She's totally silent on her humiliation of his love of Diana — and it had to be humiliating, to stay at the Widow and Diana's house, and see the musicians that Bertram has sent for someone else. Helena's scenes are much more blunt and to the point in Act 4 and 5 — much shorter, and her long, rambling speech pattern of earlier is gone. Some of that is to do with the fact that she's grown up — and I think some of it is to do with the fact that Shakespeare found her less interesting when she isn't mired in misery.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>What about the final stage of her journey? Where does Helena end the play?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Act 5 is interesting, because it's a lot of people talking around problems that Helena could solve. So instead of getting Helena and Bertram having a satisfying resolution to talk about their problems, Helena just wanders in on the last page, pregnant, and they embrace. He says if she can prove it was her in Florence, he'll love her dearly. She says if he can't see it clearly by now, they should divorce. Everyone laughs. End play — <i>and it's terrible</i>. I have no idea why he felt the need to have Parolles talk in circles about the Diana/Bertram situation for three pages when the audience is already ahead of you, and not let the central romance breathe and solidify.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What does Helena share with </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Shakespeare’s other adventurous, crossdressing ingénues — </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">roles like Rosalind, Portia, and Viola?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Well, it's interesting, because the crossdressing is so incidental to the show. It's not vitally important as in <i>As You Like It</i>, or <i>Merchant</i> or <i>Twelfth Night</i>, because it's really just a scene. What it does represent within the show is Helena at her lowest — she's failed as a woman, in her eyes. She was given everything she wanted, and her husband rejected her. She humiliated him, she humiliated the king, the Countess — Helena takes the failure of her marriage to Bertram extremely personally, and by sending herself off on a pilgrimage so he can come home, she is literally exchanging herself in the eyes of God, which is where the cross-dress comes in. She needs to be an equal sacrifice.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">But I think the spirit of fearlessness is alive and well in all four of these women — they are all women who will lay themselves on the line for others and to get things accomplished. They are all doers, and self-made women, even in times when that wasn't necessarily socially acceptable. I think people tend to think of Helena as a bit of a doormat for Bertram, and she certainly takes licks that the three ladies mentioned would not, and I think that's where she differs. You see Helena grow into her strength — you see her form before your eyes. Whereas someone like Portia is already a formidable wit and self possessed women, this is Helena's journey to get there.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Turning to the play, what does <i>All’s Well</i> offer audiences that Shakespeare’s more famous plays don’t?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I'd been begging to do this show for years, actually. I've always loved Helena, but it's a hard show to do because everyone has to have a specific skill set. You have to have a Bertram that's charming enough [that] you love him but you also believe him doing terrible things. You have to have a Parolles that seems harmless enough to stay with Bertram but has a dark edge when alone, a Countess who is strong but indulgent. Luckily for us, we actually had the right people for the task this year and the show leapt forward.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What do you love about <i>All's Well</i>?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">One of the things I love about this play is that it's really about communication, more than anything. It's about actually listening, and </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">solving </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">problems. So many of the problems in this show — Bertram and Helena's relationship, Bertram's friendship with Parolles, Bertram running away, Helena running away — could be solved by actually talking things out. Everyone takes the most difficult path to get to a certain point. And I think that it's a great tale of love overcoming our own idiocy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">We live in a period where there is a lot of talking and not a lot of listening, particularly if we don't like what's being said. So instead of problem-solving in the beginning (when it's hard and awful) we wait, and tune out, and hope someone else fixes the problem. And no one does, and problems get worse, and things spiral out of control. That's what happens here.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Of course, we have a happy ending in this show — all's well that end's well, after all — but what makes this show interesting is that we are on the knife's edge of a tragedy. The only way that this show ends happily is if everything goes exactly as it does. The end of the show always reminds me a bit of <i>Titus</i>, without the body count. So much information being given, and so much of it could be received badly. I think that's interesting for the audience, who likely haven't seen this show before. How will it end? What's going to happen? I would actually love to do a dark, dark version of this show — it's very <i>Gone Girl</i>, in a lot of respects — if Helena's actions aren't fundamentally good, then the foundation and world of the show become very, very different. And that's why I love about this show — it's an enigma that can be played a thousand different ways.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>We talked last summer about other roles in Shakespeare they’d love to play, male or female. This summer I’d like to ask about your most formative shows have been, Shakespeare-wise.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">My first Shakespeare was playing Hermia, at a place called Monomoy Theatre, and it was just absolute perfection. It was a full scale, old Greek romantic mounting of the show, and I had the best other lovers to work with, the best director. I just remember that entire show being a joy. So it was love at first production, really.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Do you have any</b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">idols or strong influences in your approach to Shakespeare?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I think in terms of idols, I remember watching Kate Winslet in Kenneth Branagh's </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Hamlet</i><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"> and just being riveted by how conversational her Ophelia was, the hidden strength and humanity in her gentleness. That's something I keep coming back to for Helena. How do you keep the core of steel but still be gentle, still be unscarred by the world?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>What about performances outside of Shakespeare?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">I've weirdly watched a lot of early Judy Garland for Helena — that doe-eyed, firm feeling of "I can do this even though I'm scared." I can't neglect to mention that Audrey Hepburn's Sabrina was a huge influence on how I played Helena. Sabrina and David's relationship in the beginning of the film is close kin to Helena and Bertram — Sabrina even bemoans that she is reaching for the moon, similar to Helena's first monologue citing Bertram as a star, he's so far above her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Thank you for taking the time to chat!</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.drillingcompany.org/" target="_blank">The Drilling Company</a>'s <i>All's Well That Ends Well</i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Jul 6 to Jul 22 </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at the Clemente Parking Lot, 114 Norfolk,<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> on the LES</span></span></span></b></span></b></span></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b> Jody Christopherson</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>photos</b> Lee Wexler/Images for Innovation</span></div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-45319431295311482242017-07-17T11:00:00.000-04:002017-07-17T13:11:38.109-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Karla Hendrick on directing All's Well…<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>By my count, almost half of NYC's Shakespeare is directed by women </b></span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">in summer '17</b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">! The Drilling Company, which stages five plays per summer, has a pair of female directors. This week I've interviewed Karla Hendrick, director of <i>All's Well That Ends Well</i> (I'll be speaking with her Helena on Thursday). A stalwart of the Drilling Company, Ms. Hendrick has previously played Gertrude with the company; this is her directorial debut.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with <i>All’s Well</i>. What knots did the playwright leave for you and your cast to untangle?</b></span></div>
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Great question! And there are plenty of knots with this play! <i>All’s Well That Ends Well</i> is categorized as one of Shakespeare’s three “Problem Plays”, perhaps because of the quick turn of events at the end propagated by an event never seen, perhaps because there is so much exposition, perhaps the quick shifts in tone; for whatever reason, it’s not frequently produced. And to a contemporary audience, it could be seen solely as the story of a smart woman who falls for the bad boy and subsequently makes dumb choices; or even a story about a cocky young man who has the heart of a woman and yet treats her badly.</div>
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<b>How do you meet that challenge?</b></div>
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When I examined the play through the lens of a coming of age story, Helena’s journey became clear and distinct and the strongest through-line of the play. Add to that the fact that Bertram, too, undergoes a clear journey, then the story opens up and begins to come together. There’s arguably a real turning point for Bertram too in the play when he becomes a war hero. Granted, the challenge is in making sense of Bertram’s journey (and that difficult final scene!) and creating a Bertram that the audience can both wince at and learn to love — but that’s what makes Shakespeare’s characters so human. Of course, the key to the final scene is setting up that final Bertram moment earlier in the play. </div>
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<b>What have you discovered about the play that you find fascinating?</b></div>
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What fascinated me most about this play is the discovery that Helena is not the only character with a clear journey, but, in fact, most every character in the play has one. We uncovered them. Also I was surprised by how strong are the themes of the healing power of the feminine and the power of forgiveness.</div>
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I’ve never seen a stage production of <i>All’s Well</i>, and hadn’t read it in a very, very long time. It took some time before I felt comfortable approaching it and delving in, it intimidated me tremendously to begin with! The more we peeled off its layers, the more I absolutely fell in love with it. It also became something of a personal story for me, and now is definitely a great time to produce it — there’s quite a lot in it that resonates with audiences of today!</div>
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<b>Why is it the right play to revive this summer in NYC?</b></div>
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We live in a society and a world right now that desperately needs a message of healing, of forgiveness, of persistent belief in “all’s well that ends well”, and how that message can drive one forward in a positive, proactive and undaunted way. We also need desperately to hook into stories of personal change and of the healing power of women and communities of women.</div>
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<b>What does it offer audiences that Shakespeare’s more famous plays don’t?</b></div>
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I liked the idea that as the characters live out their lives and journeys, there’s a constant shadow over the story of the impending unknown (we know what’s about to happen to their country, they don’t). One of my favorite lines in the play is: “The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together”. I think that’s the play in a nutshell. The joy the characters feel is overshadowed by a constant cloud; their despair is followed by joy, their joy is followed by despair. It’s very Chekhovian in that sense, and very much like life. That’s reflected in the tone with which I approached the work — moments of hilarity turn sharply to moments of touching pathos which may turn to moments of deep despair. And back again. Just like life.</div>
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<b>Did you set it in contemporary New York, or another place and time?</b></div>
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It is set in France, and there are many references to the war in Italy, so I chose to set it during WWII in France just before Mussolini’s Fascist invasion in 1940, a moment in history when many Italian soldiers turned and fought against Fascism, which meant fighting against their own countrymen. Many Frenchmen then fought beside them. It highlights certain conflicts that may resonate acutely with us as a society today while honoring the original text, but without hitting us over the head with it or forcing any contemporary connections.</div>
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<b>How do you feel about the choices Helena makes in the play, and the ones taken out of her hands?</b></div>
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Helena is making bold choices. Unapologetically. But she doesn’t start there, she has a clear journey. She takes risks and with each success, she gathers strength. I see the famous virginity scene with Parolles as an early victory; his apparent intimidation or at least verbal banter with her is unsuccessful in quieting her; her “thousand loves” speech is, in a way a big early success which frees her. She makes a huge discovery from that exchange with Parolles, that “our remedies oft in ourselves do lie.” It’s the first real moment of growing up and standing on her own two feet. Some might ask why she goes after Bertram who has only disdain for her, why does she even love this loser at all? It’s because she sees into his heart, and, having grown up with him, knows his heart and knows his most true, authentic self — who he is away from Parolles, even — a self that’s been lost along the way in the journey he’s on. She may be, in a sense, on a rescue mission; the love she feels for him throughout is powerful and drives her forward continuously; the forgiveness she offers him in the end is world-changing. Her journey is, hopefully, the audience’s journey.</div>
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<b>This production is staged in a Lower East Side parking lot. How do you address the challenges of outdoor Shakespeare?</b></div>
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Oh, my, and there are challenges! Time constraints, rain, heat, storage, you name it. It is challenging to do <i>any</i> play in a venue such as this, but the rewards are tremendous. Free Shakespeare isn’t really free; yes, it is something we give the audience without monetary cost, of course, but they do give a lot — not only their time and attention, but their laughter, their tears, their hearts and souls for two hours time which is the greatest exchange in the world. We and the audience create something together in that space that will never happen again in that way and that makes any challenge fade fast.</div>
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<b>How has the urban space</b><b> shaped your vision of the play? </b></div>
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The venue has shaped the vision mostly since opening, in that the energy of the audience has taught us much about the story. As the numbers of audience members have increased, we’ve adjusted the set to accommodate more people, to create an even more accessible, intimate experience for them. And we’ve allowed more breathing space for the audience to come in as the final character.</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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No one knew women like Shakespeare did — at least of the writers of his day — because no one knew humanity like he did. I think there is quite a lot in Shakespeare’s plays that artists could focus on more; for example, the Italian women in <i>All’s Well</i> (in our production they are a community of immigrant women living in Italy) could easily be glossed over, theirs are such short scenes and one might say the women are there to facilitate the bed trick plotline only. And yet they are the ones who Helena meets after she hits rock bottom and they reach out to her. It’s a “healing the healer” situation; the Widow takes her in, and we don’t really know how long Helena stays, but we do know that it is there that she hatches her plan and begins to run with it, getting them on board to play all the parts. Her time in their community allows her to pick herself up and move forward. They are her turning point.</div>
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<b>What are his strengths or weaknesses in depicting women?</b></div>
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I’ll go out on a limb here and say that his is the strength, and if there’s a weakness, perhaps the weakness belongs to artists who may short-change those characters or their interpretation of them. Perhaps we don’t give his women enough power sometimes — the power they may be written to have. But then again, perhaps Shakespeare’s weakness in depicting women was simply in not writing enough of them! (And of course, in the constraints he was working with regarding their role in society — not his fault — and even within that, he broke through time and time again).</div>
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<b>Do you have any experimental takes on Shakespeare—an all-female cast, or a radical adaptation—that you’d love to stage?</b></div>
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In this production we have cast a woman as LaVatch, the fool, traditionally played by a man. She’s playing it as a woman and having a great time with it! Switching LaVatch’s gender opened up a lot for us thematically and with the story line, actually, we were still making discoveries late into the process.</div>
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<b>Do you have a short-list of Shakespearean plays to direct?</b></div>
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I’ve always wanted to do <i>Comedy of Errors</i> with two female Dromio’s; I’d love to do <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> with two women (last season the The Drilling Company, who also produces Bryant Park Shakespeare, cast a woman as Mercutio – she’s now playing our Helena).</div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.drillingcompany.org/" target="_blank">The Drilling Company</a>'s <i>All's Well That Ends Well</i></span></b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Jul 6 to Jul 22 </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at the the Clemente Parking Lot, 114 Norfolk,<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> on the LES</span></span></span></b></span></b></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>photos</b> Lee Wexler/Images for Innovation</span></div>
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</style>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-55930896792281288842017-07-13T11:00:00.000-04:002017-07-13T12:56:09.645-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Shalita Grant on Hermia<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women in Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgax9hCTiSek-iz4DOXY5CmfXQ0i3yE6sW3DBpYCm6h2G7zgFxBqpHa2yquB36tBtwXAX-2OOHjIDhmJQb9an_qaqJSqMJ67xnzJ7FDPfhAdjnFayG3oI6WVLl7m3IKCF1AScsaF0sdNYQ/s1600/Midsummer+-+Public+%252717+-+headshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="701" data-original-width="496" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgax9hCTiSek-iz4DOXY5CmfXQ0i3yE6sW3DBpYCm6h2G7zgFxBqpHa2yquB36tBtwXAX-2OOHjIDhmJQb9an_qaqJSqMJ67xnzJ7FDPfhAdjnFayG3oI6WVLl7m3IKCF1AScsaF0sdNYQ/s320/Midsummer+-+Public+%252717+-+headshot.jpg" width="226" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">summer,<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> Shalita Grant<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays Hermia, one of the young lovers thrown into confusion in <i>A Midsummer Night's Dream</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. </span></span></span></span></span></span></b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Audiences are probably most familiar with her TV work on <i>NCIS: New Orleans</i>, or her Tony-winning perf in</b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> <i>Vanya & Sonja & Masha & Spike</i>. </span></span></span></span></span></span></b></span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">But she's also performed in Shakespeare </b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at the Delacorte Theater and elsewhere in NYC. </span></span></span></span></span></span></b></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I emailed with her about her role in <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Midsummer</i>.</span></span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Hermia. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">First of all, I am filled with gratitude to be back at the Park and working with the Public theater. This role was a dream of mine since high school, so to come back to the Park and do it is magical!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Hermia and I are very similar. The play opens with her in an incredibly sexist environment, and save for Hippolyta (who says nothing) it’s a group of men telling her what to do, and if she doesn’t they’ll kill her. She makes the bold choice to run away. What’s fascinating is that we haven’t made very much progress since Shakespeare’s era. Every woman in the rehearsal room deals with sexism so I didn’t have to dig too deep to know how Hermia feels.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><i>Midsummer</i>’s quartet of lovers can be seen as generic and interchangeable or as full-dimensioned individuals, depending on the staging. How have you and </b></span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">your Helena approached your roles?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Annaleigh Ashford [Helena] has been a breath of fresh air and a dream to work with. I love it when actors are willing to play and find and discover because that’s also how I work. Hermia and Helena are different people with different journeys, and while Annaleigh and I have similarities in how we work, we are very different women. So, I think people will see that. It’s inherent.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Turning to the production, you’re in the happy (and too-rare) position of working on Shak with a woman as director. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How has gender informed your conversations with Ms. deBessonet on the play?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It’s fabulous to work with a woman on this because there’s a shorthand we already have just because of our gendered life experiences. She has encouraged a stronger Hermia and not the weeping ingenue. This decision makes not only the role but the production more interesting. All of the characters are active and actively trying to reach their goals. So it’s exciting to watch them change tactics and fight and fail.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><i>Midsummer</i> may be a timeless classic and a fun comedy, but why is it also the right play to revive this summer?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Our country is in dark uncertainty. Political pluralism is under attack and even civility is tenuous or non-existent in some places. Every morning I roll over and grab my phone and see rights have been taken away, unarmed citizens have been murdered by police and the victim's humanity is up for debate, the president and his many, many scandals and scandalous behavior; I’m tired before I even get out of bed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But every night for the next month or so, I get to make people laugh and forget for a second how obnoxious and scary it is right now. We get to make you laugh and for two and half hours (with an intermission) you get to feel safe. The first day of rehearsal, Lear said, “This play is about what it means to be human.” Our humanity is more than pain, even if it’s what many of us are feeling at the present. <i>Midsummer</i> is a great reminder.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think the thing to remember was in Shakespeare’s time, men played the women’s roles. And speaking specifically to <i>Midsummer</i>, what’s fascinating is how strong the women are. His strengths in this play is setting up the real obstacles that women have to face in society. A friend saw our production and said, “The first scene really hit home, it was so gross watching those men do that!” The biggest weakness is that after Hermia and Helena get married… they don’t really speak!</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Is there anything in his plays that’s beyond salvaging?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And as far as the most egregious elements of Shakespeare? In our production, we cut all the racism (I mean, in our day do we need more of that?) and even though our culture still suffers from a Eurocentric standard of beauty, I don’t think it’s worth derailing the magic of the other parts of the story for it. I think every production has to think and talk about how to handle the inherent racism in Shakespeare’s plays.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either — any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I would love to play Cordelia, and made a real case to play Othello when I was at Juilliard (I didn’t get to). But I would be more interested in playing Iago!</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.publictheater.org/" target="_blank">The Public Theater</a>'s <i>Midsummer Night's Dream</i></span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Jul 13 to Aug 13 </b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at the Delacorte Theater<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span></span></span></b></span>in <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Central Park</span>. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b> Elena Gharbigi</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>photos</b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Simon Luethi</span></span></div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-24084472776574787372017-06-16T11:00:00.000-04:002017-06-19T12:13:21.507-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Cara Ricketts on Isabella<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since
most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage
tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This
is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm
talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related
work in New York City.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">summer<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, Car<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">a Ricketts <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays Isabella, the nun <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">thrown into a moral quand<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ar<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">y</span></span></span> in <i>Me<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">asure for Measure</span></i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The production<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, at Theater for a New Audience<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, is directed by Simon Godwin, who<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">se</span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">gender-bent <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Tw<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">elfth Night</span></i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> last winter <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">was the talk of Shakespearean </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></b></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">London</b><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. Ms. Ricketts has <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">earned notice in Ont<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ario, </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span>where she's <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">played Portia, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Im<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ogen, and others onstage<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> at</span></span></span> t<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">he Stra<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">tford Festival.</span></span> I emailed with her about her role in <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Godwin's NYC production.</span></span></b><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Let’s start with Isabella. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</span></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Isabella, like all the ingenue roles in Shakespeare is not soft or weak or innocent. Isabella is a young woman with strong ideas that she truly believes in. As her story progresses in </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Measure for Measure</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> she is forced to review her own personal laws to see if they still hold under the special circumstances that the play takes place. Not only does Isabella face these problems head on, she fights them, battles them to a death and looks for support.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> Which scenes are the most challenging?</span></span></b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The scene that is most challenging is the Angelo scene. I'm fortunate to be working with Simon and Thomas who were will to listen to me and the other women in the room (stage management and assistant director Emma) as we discussed what it's like to be sexual harassed or assaulted as women. To explore that scene with the discussion we had and the viewpoints shared really opened the scene in a way that I hope the audience will be affected by. We were interested in telling the story of a woman put in that position truthfully.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</span></span></b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What knots did Shakespeare <i>not</i> leave for me to untangle? Ha ha! I enjoy Shakespeare for that reason. I feel that there are hints in the text that can tell you a lot. The journey for me in rehearsal is to Nancy Drew the script until shows what I need to perform it.</span></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think one of the play’s themes involves Isabella’s autonomy. As an actor, how do you feel about the choices she makes in the play, and the ones taken out of her hands?</span></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Isabella has fallen out of love with Vienna, for quite some time. She has decided to remove herself from it and devote her life to prayer. She enters the Poor Clares cloister which means she will have little to no contact with the world save for her fellow nuns. But she's about to dedicate her life to God and prayer and thoughts.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Isabella made the choice to not be a part of Vienna and immediately Shakespeare says no and throws her into the muck. Isabella doesn't want to play from the very beginning but her love for her brother pulls her in and dunks her in to the very world she is trying to avoid. I believe that it is not until Act 5 that she makes a choice that is not out of necessity. All her choices in the play are in service for her brother, she might think that she would give her brother up for her honor, but her actions speak the opposite.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Her role in the plays action is Mercy. She begs for it and commands it only to later be asked for it from her enemy. If the Duke is Justice, Isabella is the other half that will bring the grace necessary to make Vienna right. It's why he asks for her hand, the Duke sees something right in Isabella to rule his dream for a new Vienna.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I read that you played Hedda Gabler in Toronto — does she have a kinship with Isabella?</span></span></b><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Hedda is so much fun because she is a woman who makes decisions that people don't agree with. Especially as a woman people will want to tell you how to handle things or expect a certain kind of reaction. If Hedda had been a man there won't have been much of a play. Isabella has the same hurdle to overcome or rather ignore. She makes the decision after weighing her chastity to her brother's life and a lot of people judge her for that. Isabella is closer to someone like Lady M in that she is persuasive and she is good at it. Isabella is a force to be reckoned with and I believe this appeals to Angelo in that she is able to debate with him and keep up. Viola had to dress up like a man to exist in a man's world, Isabella dares to go as herself.</span></span><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Turning to the play, what does <i>Measure for Measure</i> offer audiences that Shakespeare’s more famous plays don’t? Why is it a good play to revive now?</span></span></b><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is my first time working on <i>Measure.</i> It's interesting because it's a Shakespearian comedy, I believe one of his last. In <i>Measure</i> I can feel him stretch the genre as far as it seems to be able to go. At any moment if feels like it's going to be a tragedy but somehow it snaps back with the comedy ending of marriage and hope.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The ideas in this play ring to me, almost more than the characters. There is a meditation on death, then life and the play has such darkness and yet ends with forgiveness. So many times I find myself wondering "would I do that if I was in that situation?" It's a modern play in that way, it's very easy to see it as a play about those big ideas and it asks us to consider what we think of them: justice, and more importantly forgiveness. I read that <i>Measure for Measure</i> was first performed as part of Christmas celebration and I love that idea. On the birthday of the Jesus who died for our sins is a play about forgiveness.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It's a problem play in the old sense (defined by F.S. Boas) that we are looking at social problems and moral dilemmas. the problems and dilemmas are the same ones we face as a society today so the play has an impact. It asks the right question when we live in a time were we feel that society is divided.</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ricketts as Hedda Gabler<br />
at Necessary Angel in Toronto, 2016</td></tr>
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<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women? </span></span></b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What I like about Shakespeare is that his characters have universal journeys. Every once in a while something will ring out to me… lines like "a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear" but he also wrote Othello and Aaron the Moor as two different men. It's remarkable that he wrote such parts about women when he didn't have women to play them. I think the reason why so many of his female characters run out to the woods dressed as boys was so that the boys playing girls could act more freely once they ditched the dress.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Where are his weaknesses in depicting women?</span></span></b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span>I think my biggest complaint would be how he goes on about pale beauty, I know it was the rage at the time but it's kinda boring now don't you think? Shakespeare knew too, hence the 'Dark Lady' sonnets. Ha!</span></span><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play?</span></span></b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I never have parts that I wish to play. I never really understand the parts until I'm in rehearsal and I appreciate the life that other actors create when it comes to playing Shakespearean roles.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>What about one of the traditionally male roles?</b> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think if I were to play a man's part I would like to feel what Hamlet goes through. To break down that text and peer into the engine of that part. Maybe King Leontes in <i>Winter's Tale</i>. I would like to play a male role at some point, just to feel it.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">TFANA's <i>Measure for Measure</i></span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">plays </span>from Jun 17 to Jul 16 </b><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at the Polon<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">s<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ky Shakespeare Center </span></span></span></b></span> in <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Fort Greene</span>. Tickets at <a href="http://tfana.org/">TFANA.org</a>!</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>rehearsal photo</b> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Gerry Goodstein</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span></span>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-19885266298171407262017-06-02T11:00:00.000-04:002017-06-02T11:00:10.181-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Kate Ross on Margaret<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<b>Smith Street Stages is Carroll Gardens' own outdoor troupe, with almost a decade of summer Shakespeare behind it. Last season the company produced a <i>Tempest</i> with a gender-swapped Prospero, with Kate Ross in the role. This summer she's taken on the role of Margaret in <i>Richard III</i>, a rich and memorable role despite its brevity. I emailed with Ms. Ross about her work in this show and last year's <i>Tempest</i>.</b></div>
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<b>Let’s start with Margaret. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></div>
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Her capacity for rage. Margaret only has two scenes in the play, but she comes on with guns blazing. I’m fascinated by her focus on Queen Elizabeth. Objectively, Elizabeth has wronged her and her family less than just about anyone else on that stage, but Margaret really lays into her more than she does Richard, even while recognizing Richard as the true villain, the troubler of the poor world’s peace. There is a lot of complex and contradictory things at play here to untangle — anger, resentment, gall, but also solidarity and some degree of kinship.</div>
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<b>Queen Margaret is the largest part in Shakespeare’s complete works. How you view her role in <i>Richard III</i>? What sort of power does she have?</b></div>
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Her arc through all the <i>Henry VI</i> plays through <i>Richard III</i> is incredible. How amazing it would be to get to do them all! By the time we see Margaret in <i>Richard III</i>, her power is almost entirely gone. Her husband, child, title, and position have all been taken from her. All she has left is her language. She wields her language as a weapon to attack and pierce and humble and damn.</div>
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<b>What sets her apart from Shakespeare's other powerful women, like Cleopatra, Lady Macbeth, and Lear's daughters?</b></div>
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Margaret is unmoored by all she has been through. She doesn’t have ties to king or country or husband or children. The magnitude of the loss is immense, but it also affords her a kind of freedom that is, I think, unique. As she literally has nothing left to lose, she can just it rip. And she survives! The body count is high in this play, but Shakespeare has Margaret retire to France.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ross as Prospero in last summer's <i>Tempest</i></td></tr>
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<b>Last year you played the lead in Smith Street’s <i>Tempest</i>, also outdoors. How does that environment affect your performance?</b></div>
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It is definitely helpful to have had the experience of performing in Carroll Park before. It is a wonderful place to play, with the audience very present and involved, but it is challenging vocally. There is a real intimacy to performances here, with the audience very front and center, but the space is also very expansive — no walls or ceiling for your voice to bounce off of. It really requires an actor to keep his or her instrument in good shape!</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women? Is there anything in his plays that’s beyond salvaging?</b></div>
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Shakespeare writes wonderful women — I just wish there were more of them! It has been liberating to see more cross-gender casting being done, because there is such a dearth of roles for women. While there are certainly problematic aspects of some of his plays, I don’t see anything that is beyond salvaging — it is just another puzzle to be solved. For example, I always considered <i>Winter’s Tale</i> to be problematic, as I never could buy into Leontes turning so completely against Hermione at the top with no reason. I just didn’t believe it. But when I saw Joby Earle do the part in a recent Smith St. Stage presentation of the play, I believed it utterly. The “tricky bits” are all just nuts to crack!</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to?</b></div>
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Oh, so many. I would love to get a chance to do Margaret in all the <i>Henry VI</i>’s. I would love a go at Beatrice, Tamora, Paulina, and Volumina. I think it would be amazing to give Prospero another shot in a few years — that is one I can imagine doing once a decade until I keel over.</div>
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<b><a href="http://www.smithstreetstage.org/">Smith Street Stage</a> mounts <i>Richard III</i> from Jun 7 to 25 in Carroll Park in Carroll Gardens. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<b>headshot</b> Leal Vona</div>
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<b>photos</b> Chris Montgomery</div>
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-->Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-72014971639457942432017-04-24T11:00:00.000-04:002017-04-24T14:13:35.614-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Danaya Esperanza as Viola<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<b>Twice each season, the Public Theater's <a href="http://www.publictheater.org/en/Programs--Events/Mobile-Unit/">Mobile Unit</a> tours NYC neighborhoods with stagings of classic plays. The company is about to conclude its all-boro tour of Twelfth Night with a brief run at its home on Lafayette Street. Danaya Esperanza led the cast across the five boroughs as their Viola. Recently she's appeared in several new plays Off-Broadway, most notably in <i>Men in Boats</i> at Clubbed Thumb.</b></div>
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<b>Let’s start with Viola. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating? What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></div>
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I find Viola's agency both captivating and infuriating. In the beginning of the play, she takes her fate into her own hands very quickly and with resolve — and though she knows she can only control so much, she takes control. Once she is betrothed at the end of the play, she is silent. Orsino speaks for her and yet he never says her name — she is his mistress, she is simply <i>his</i>. We've experimented a bit with the lines at the end of the play in our production, but the text as Shakespeare wrote it leaves me with several thoughts/questions: If this truly is the cusp of Viola's "happiness," why is she silent? She has spent the play expressing herself, so is this silence relief? Or is it fear? Why does Shakespeare leave her dressed as Cesario? Is the heterosexual nature of this future marriage a disappointment? Why can't Orsino want me as I choose to be?</div>
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<b>As an actor, can you speak to what makes her such a fully-realized woman onstage?</b></div>
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I am a woman. Viola is fully realized because I am a living, breathing being. I am real, so Viola is real.</div>
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<b>How does she view and deal with the world that Shakespeare creates onstage?</b></div>
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Viola has a kind of limitless mobility in the play, shared only with Feste because it is usually reserved for fools. I believe Viola's ability to move seamlessly between Orsino and Olivia's households comes from her tragic sensibility combined with her love of wit: she is beautifully clever even as her heart is breaking. For me, this combination is the key to her survival.</div>
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<b>Viola is one of a type: Shakespeare’s adventurous, crossdressing ingénues. What does she share with roles like Portia, Rosalind, and Imogen?</b></div>
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With all of these roles, I believe Shakespeare reveals the lack of agency that women had in his sociopolitical climate. I think we are drawn to them now because we recognize how far we have come and how far we still have to go. All of these women feel freedom when they are treated as men's equals, and more often superiors, but this only comes when they disguise themselves. Why? That's one question I want our audiences to walk away with and to discuss with the people in their lives.</div>
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<b>Delving more deeply into your thoughts on <i>Twelfth Night</i>, how does your perspective as a woman of color influence your portrayal of Viola?</b></div>
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In our production, Viola is an Afro Cuban refugee in Miami. This is a rare gift for me because I actually am a Cuban refugee. I grew up feeling a deep sense of loss for Cuba, a home I did not know long enough; and I grew up feeling that I didn't truly belong anywhere in the US, to any particular group besides "Cuban immigrants." I was never really allowed in anywhere else (though this is changing for me now — I think ostracized groups are coming together as a force and voice for equality, but I didn't experience this level of unity growing up). And in Cuba, I am Americanizada. I am also queer. Always the Other.</div>
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I think this is exactly Viola's position: the Other. In the play, I end up working for a white man and wooing a white Cuban woman on his behalf. And I am misunderstood by them both. I'm the mysterious Other who brings Olivia and Orsino's worlds together. In fact, all of the servants in our production happen to be immigrants and/or people of color and/or LGBTQ. We mirror our society: We compose the complicated inner mechanisms on which the world of the play is built and runs — we compose the complicated inner mechanisms on which this country was built and continues to run.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either — any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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I'm going to play Edmund one day.</div>
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<b>The Public's Mobile Unit stages <i><a href="https://www.publictheater.org/Public-Theater-Season/Mobile-Unit-Twelfth-Night/" target="_blank">Twelfth Night</a></i> from Apr 24 to May 14 at the Public Theater in the Village. Tickets are free!</b></div>
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<b>headshot</b> n/a</div>
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<b>photos</b> Joan Marcus</div>
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</style>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-10856600884827352712017-03-31T11:00:00.000-04:002017-04-01T08:11:37.878-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Lauren Tothero as Sebastian<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">This spring in Flushing Meadows, Titan Theatre Company </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">has cast a pair of twins in <i>Twelfth Night</i>. Yesterday I spoke with Sierra Tothero, who plays Viola. Today, I'm talking with her sister Lauren about Viola's twin—a male, so we get to talk about cross-gender casting.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Sebastian. What have you discovered about him?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I love Sebastian’s earnestness, especially within his relationships. He loves simply and without reservation. He falls in love with Olivia at first sight, which is really quite Romeo-esque. That said, my favorite part of Sebastian is his friendship with Antonio. They have true love for each other. Platonic love between two men isn’t represented enough in pop culture, and the friendship between Antonio and Sebastian is such a great example of healthy masculinity.</span></div>
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<b>What role does Sebastian play in the world that Shakespeare creates onstage, and in your understanding of the play?</b></div>
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From a narrative standpoint, Sebastian just comes in and confuses the heck out of people. Except he has no idea that he’s doing it. To me, this gives him an endearing, almost childlike quality. He literally has no idea what is going on: “Why did this beautiful woman just kiss me?” “Why are all these people trying to beat me up?” What I love the most about the “This is the air” monologue is that it’s the first time that he gets to really express this confusion, and he does it with such a childlike wonder.</div>
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Sebastian has such an earnest, childlike quality to him which, to me, really sets him apart. He’s not as witty as Viola is, and he takes everything at face value. When Antonio saves Viola during the fight, her first response is “Oh my gosh Sebastian might be alive.” Sebastian isn’t able to put two and two together like that.</div>
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<b>I’m interested in cross-gender casting, so I’d love to hear how you approach Sebastian’s gender and sexuality.</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv-eWC736cG0bTJKe-hOW7AY6ek8onjpLRAHZw2DBQK5oNd-YavD6SHH5CMsiOkguDBGzREKiYHlLswFWlhKRGMJnrBFNyvmaCUWuD8qtKuUFlxmdNDzCeX4R-xsJ-wu9fPaw9kwv6mmg/s1600/Twelfth+Night+-+Titan+-+twins.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv-eWC736cG0bTJKe-hOW7AY6ek8onjpLRAHZw2DBQK5oNd-YavD6SHH5CMsiOkguDBGzREKiYHlLswFWlhKRGMJnrBFNyvmaCUWuD8qtKuUFlxmdNDzCeX4R-xsJ-wu9fPaw9kwv6mmg/s320/Twelfth+Night+-+Titan+-+twins.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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I never wanted to be a woman playing a man. I just wanted to be a man. I never wanted it to be a caricature, so I kept the physical adjustments subtle. That said, I wanted there to be a very clear difference between Viola and Sebastian in the final scene, when we’re both on stage for the first time. If you watch a man and a woman walk down the street, there really isn’t a huge difference between the two. I never wanted to be a “crotch-scratching, burping” cartoon of a man. I focused more on how men and women take up space in the world. How men aren’t afraid to square their shoulders. How they tend to take larger, slower steps. It was more of an energetic thing than anything else. I read about different techniques (primarily from Eastern philosophies) to increase masculine energy. I wanted it to start from an internal shift, as opposed to an external “just walk like a dude” one.</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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He did his best considering the time period he was writing in. By having women characters disguised as men, it gave him more rein to give them complex, interesting inner lives. You can see the progression of his female characters from his earlier works to his later works. Obviously, <i>The Taming of the Shrew</i> leaves much to be desired. But it’s encouraging to see the growth of his characters. I mean, Juliet is hugely feminist, and even has sexual agency. Lady Macbeth is allowed to be this power-hungry character. Because of the time he was writing in, the male characters will be more interesting. But there’s really no excuse anymore as to why you only have to cast as written. More, if not all, Shakespeare productions should use gender-blind casting.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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I would love to play Iago one day. He’s by far my favorite Shakespeare villain. He’s just so freaking confusing, which is such a great challenge for an actor. He’s also the complete opposite of who I would be typically cast as, which makes it all the more intriguing to see how I would approach the role.</div>
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I’d also like to take a swing at Viola one of these days. ;)</div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: start;"><a href="http://www.titantheatrecompany.com/" target="_blank"><br /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: start;"><b><a href="http://www.titantheatrecompany.com/" target="_blank">Titan Theatre Company</a></b><b>'s </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">Twelfth Night</i><b> runs from March 24 to April 9 at the Queens Theater in Flushing Meadows Park. Tickets are $18.</b></span></div>
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<b>headshot</b> David Noles</div>
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</span>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-85261095135565738732017-03-30T11:00:00.000-04:002017-04-03T14:04:32.386-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Sierra Tothero as Viola<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Titan Theatre Company </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">makes its home in Queens, at first in nearby Long Island City but now in residence at the <a href="http://queenstheatre.org/" target="_blank">Queens Theatre</a>, on the grounds of the 1964 World's Fair in Flushing. They</b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> first came onto my radar with a 2013 production of <i>Midsummer</i>. Before each performance, the cast (aside from Puck) drew their roles from a hat. This spring, in another flourish of casting, Titan has cast a pair of twins as Viola and Sebastian. I emailed Sierra Tothero about her roles as Viola, and I'll have Lauren's interview here tomorrow.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Viola. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating? Which scenes are the most challenging?</b></span></div>
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Viola is incredibly brave, kind, and headstrong, all while maneuvering the world with a wide open heart. She speaks her mind to Orsino and boldly disagrees with him at times, and in my eyes that’s what makes him trust her so quickly. Connecting to her falling so deeply in love with Orsino while he is actively in pursuit of someone else has been fascinating — the act of helping someone you are in love with pursue someone else <i>because</i> you love them so much. She has to be so selfless.</div>
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Also connecting to her continuous grief — of her brother, of her home, of any connection to family — all while she is falling in love has been such an enjoyably challenging process. There is this moment Lenny and I worked on a lot where Viola is as honest as she possibly can be with Orsino. She describes her current state of pining and love towards him all under the guise of Cesario telling a story about his sister. It’s this pleading moment where she’s begging Orsino to <i>please hear what I’m actually saying here</i> and it just goes completely over his head. It’s so painful and hopeless and, honestly, who hasn’t been there? The simplicity in that moment was challenging to me — as an actor (and maybe as a young actor in particular) I always want to make something <i>active</i> and <i>bold</i> and <i>loud</i> — when sometimes the truth of the moment is a very quiet and focused <i>please hear me</i>.</div>
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<b>What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></div>
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There are some moments in the play where Viola lies and it’s not totally clear why. Why does she tell Malvolio that Olivia “took the ring of [her]” instead of saying the truth, that Olivia never gave her the ring? To which Malvolio responds with another lie, that Olivia told him Viola “peevishly threw it to her” even though Olivia said nothing of the sort. Those are the sorts of things you just find your own way into, and I don’t think there’s any wrong or right story you can create for yourself.</div>
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<b>Viola is one of Shakespeare’s essential roles. As an actor, can you speak to what makes her such a fully-realized woman onstage? What role does she play in the world that Shak creates onstage, and in your understanding of the play?</b></div>
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Throughout the play, Viola is courageous, resourceful, smitten, befuddled, brazen, desperate, grief-stricken, and joyous. She has many moments where she admits that she has <i>no idea</i> how this is all going to turn out, but she is certainly willing to take a bash at it. She goes through this shipwreck where she loses her twin brother and still has to continue on. She doesn’t get to mourn like Olivia does, and she carries loss with her as she falls in love. It’s very rich to me.</div>
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I also appreciate that her love interest isn’t necessarily the most important man in her life (or at least not the <i>only</i> important man in her life). When her brother enters the stage in that final scene, all of her attention goes to him. She completely lets go of her act as Cesario — her connection to Orsino — to reveal herself as Viola to Sebastian. It of course ends up working out in the end with Orsino, but the fact that she gets completely overwhelmed with a different love — the love for her brother — in that final scene is a very true thing to me. We all have many loves in our life, and I appreciate that that is illustrated. It’s gorgeous and true blue.</div>
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<b>Viola is one of a type: Shakespeare’s adventurous, crossdressing ingénues. </b><b>What sets her apart from</b><b> Portia, Rosalind, and Imogen?</b></div>
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Viola’s necessity for cross-dressing is purely for survival. She has to fend for herself. She is grief-stricken, a stranger in a foreign land, and in danger as a woman traveling alone. She isn’t trying to trick anyone, spy on anyone, or make anyone fall in love with her. She has this pure intention of “I gotta do what I gotta do because no one’s going to take care of me anymore” in the first scene that is both heartbreaking and endearing.</div>
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<b>The actor cast as Viola gets to play with Elizabethan wit and perform love poetry. What strategies do you have for the wordplay and the verse? Have you seen any great, influential versions of <i>Twelfth Night</i> that you drew from (or rejected)?</b></div>
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I had the extremely good fortune of studying at the Globe Theatre in London for six months with Tim Carroll as my primary teacher and director. Tim is somewhat of a purist when it comes to the iambic pentameter, and because that six months has been far and away my most intensive classical training, I have become a bit of one as well. We spent weeks reading plays and slapping our knees in the rhythm of the iambic pentameter (duhDUHduhDUHduhDUHduhDUHduhDUH), speaking entire plays in that rhythm without deviation. You would do monologues with the rest of the class tapping the rhythm on their legs and if you got off you would have to sit down and someone else would go. He also put an extreme focus on being word perfect which made me be a bit obsessive about that.</div>
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This was right during the time when his productions of <i>Twelfth Night</i> and <i>Richard III</i> were at the Globe and transferring to the West End. I saw both productions at the Globe and then sat in the house for a week of tech at the West End. Watching such incredible actors (Mark Rylance, Paul Chahidi, Colin Hurley, etc.) speak the text with such skill was a masterclass. Many of Tim’s actors in the company of <i>Twelfth Night</i> and <i>Richard III</i> stayed true to the meter, but you’d also have Mark Rylance riffing off the rhythm to create impactful moments because it would make your ear perk up. Apparently Mark Rylance considers Shakespeare to be like jazz — once you master the form you can take some moments to skillfully depart from it.</div>
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I very much believe in the importance of the iambic pentameter. It’s beautiful — it falls in line with the heartbeat, it’s lovely to listen to, it seems to fit perfectly into the human attention span — and I feel like it’s a beautiful thing to respect and take advantage of. It’s a great tool as an actor. I’m also pretty obsessive about knowing exactly what I’m saying and the context of it, because when you’re connected to the meaning you tend to fall on verse pretty effortlessly. It’s almost magic like that.</div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women? Is there anything in his plays that’s beyond salvaging?</b></div>
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Well, he was certainly a product of his time and there are moments in his plays when that is reflected. We actually removed in the line from the infamous ring monologue that discusses the weak and waxen nature of women ("How easy is it for the proper false in women’s waxen hearts to set their forms! Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we, for such as we are made of, such we be.") and I have no qualms leaving it out. We’ve evolved past that mentality and I would hate for someone in the audience to be turned off from the story because of an outdated sexist moment. I know I have a hard time watching <i>The Taming of the Shrew</i> because of the themes, and I don’t want anyone in the audience to feel that way about <i>Twelfth Night</i>. Viola is a brave, resourceful, and strong-willed, and I think many of the women in his plays reflect those qualities.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either — any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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Oh lord...this is a can of worms! I did love playing Juliet. I’m such a romantic (I love falling in love onstage haha), and I loved celebrating that naive, unapologetic, young love. Actors I know who have played Hamlet say they wish that part on everyone, and I think that would be quite the feat. The fools have always been my favorite parts of Shakespeare’s plays and I loved playing Speed in <i>The Two Gentlemen of Verona</i>. I would like to play Launce, the other fool in <i>Two Gents</i> as well. He has this monologue that I think is so hilarious — it was one of the first times in a Shakespeare piece where I was laughing uncontrollably. I loved it so much I memorized the entire thing in one night, and it’s a pretty long piece.</div>
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Then Ophelia, Lady Percy, Portia, Romeo, the Witches, Orsino (again...I love being in love onstage)…. I could go on and on! Watching Lauren as Sebastian has gotten me jazzed about that role too (she is so funny as him). Maybe one of these performances we’ll just switch ;) </div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: start;"><a href="http://www.titantheatrecompany.com/" target="_blank"><br /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: start;"><b><a href="http://www.titantheatrecompany.com/" target="_blank">Titan Theatre Company</a></b><b>'s </b><i style="font-weight: bold;">Twelfth Night</i><b> runs from March 24 to April 9 at the Queens Theater in Flushing Meadows Park. Tickets are $18.</b></span></div>
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<b>headshot</b> David Noles</div>
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<b>photos</b> Michael Pauley</div>
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</span>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-4578406675415822552017-01-30T11:00:00.000-05:002017-01-30T17:49:14.379-05:00Women in Shakespeare: Kate T. Billingsley as Lady Macbeth<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Frog & Peach </b><b>was founded in 1996 by members of the Actors Studio.</b><b> The company has focused on Shakespeare, supplying Off-Off-Broadway with a semi-annual regimen since 2012. </b></span><b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">This month, F&P take up residence at the new Sheen Center, just off the Bowery, with <i>Macbeth</i>. <a href="https://katetbillingsley.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Kate T. Billingsley</a> plays the part of Lady Macbeth, and emailed with me about the role's rewards.</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Lady Macbeth. What have you discovered about her?</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The thing I find most fascinating about Lady M is her tragically glorious arc from beginning to end. The audience never gets to see her before getting the news of her husband’s encounter with the prophesying witches. She starts with the letter, with the news. I’ve often thought about what she was like before getting this letter. What kind of life must she have had to have wanted to attempt to assassinate the king and become a monarch herself? What sort of world was this woman living in? What have her experiences with men been like? In what ways can I relate to her own feelings of ambition and control? She is hungrier for power than her husband and ultimately, the Lady is the one who pulls the strings behind his actions and is left tangled in the knots she has created.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The most difficult scene for me is the “sleep-walking” scene. I say this because of what it demands of my body and psyche. At the end of each performance, if I am not completely wiped out, I have not done her justice. Another scene I find challenging is the murder scene. The change I have to make in a matter of seconds from before smearing the grooms with blood to after is something I work to go deeper with every night. It changes for her from that moment on and she is never the same again. There is always more to search for. That’s how big these characters and their stories are.</span><br />
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">What else have you discovered about Lady M’s inner life?</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Cracking open Lady M has been an enormous challenge. She is intimidatingly intelligent and full of energy. It’s as if she has this engine inside of her that is charging from the gate. She is daring enough to call on spirits to help her be bold and uncaring enough to commit murder. She is facile enough to be able to manipulate her husband into following through with the murder.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When it comes to the actual murder itself, she admits she cannot do it because King Duncan resembles her father as he lay sleeping. So instead she waits with bated breath as her husband does the deed. This is ultimately, where I believe the misogyny of the Elizabethan era falls into place. Because even though she evokes these evil spirits to fill her with “direst cruelty” so that she can kill the King, ultimately, she cannot follow through with the deed. She is still too filled with sentimentality to do it. So, instead, Shakespeare makes her an accomplice, but not the murderer. Therein lies the burn.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>What drives her to commit murder?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think what drives her is a burning curiosity to understand the vastness of her own power as a woman and partner in her time. Her husband relies on her and confides in her. How many hours has she spent waiting and tending to their manor while he is off in battle? There must have been a tremendous time of reflection and thought as to how she fits into the picture of climbing success. It seems to me she has battled the patriarchy her whole life and found a partner who understands the pains that came with her journey. The Macbeths both seem to have pasts in which they came together to save one another and truly rely on one another as equals. This seems very modern to me, as does her relentless ambition to dig herself out of the hole she started out in. The first step was marrying Macbeth.</span><br />
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<b>How do you approach her mad scenes, and play them honestly?</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I truly feel the mad scenes are subjective and every Lady M is different. I hope mine rings true. When she returns from smearing the blood and placing the daggers, she is forever changed. From that transition on, she is a different person. The night terrors begin and do not end. She is truly battling the fatigue and hauntings throughout the second half of the play, not to mention the crumbling demise of her husband and truest love. I feel she tries her best to save face as much as possible; to try to keep herself together, to keep her husband together. The ultimate failure for her is the loss of her husband’s mind and partnership, and the guilt she did not expect to have.</span><br />
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<b>What links her end to the sane woman earlier in the play?</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I feel these mad scenes all link back to the beginning. It’s as if the spirits she cries out to are teaching her a lesson as to why one shouldn’t play with the occult if they aren’t prepared for the consequences. When working with her madness, I focus on loss and I work with the physical effects of insomnia and the imagery of night terrors. Being a member of The Actors Studio, I have a psychological approach to all my characters and work a great deal with the sensory. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuNFQb_lCnrRwR9KgaTb3wvVK9ZgygXvOPy42WT5TmhYQFLCT9UDMN1x_qzythBg1AGfJMxMGcvmJfOEkQTvQWUYOcQQgcTKIwQcvnKlakK4Ci2FXnqlPV9CwNvV-AYWINH9AEQiUC2QU/s1600/Macbeth+-+Frog+%2526+Peach+-+photo+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuNFQb_lCnrRwR9KgaTb3wvVK9ZgygXvOPy42WT5TmhYQFLCT9UDMN1x_qzythBg1AGfJMxMGcvmJfOEkQTvQWUYOcQQgcTKIwQcvnKlakK4Ci2FXnqlPV9CwNvV-AYWINH9AEQiUC2QU/s200/Macbeth+-+Frog+%2526+Peach+-+photo+1.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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I think Shakespeare writes brilliant women. Their strength often lies in their intelligence: emotional and/or intellectual. They are often the whisperer in the protagonists ear, the strength behind the action of their male counterparts. They are often ruthless and sensual, cut-throat and demanding, lyrical and bold. He wrote dynamic women, many of whom are quite modern. I think his language is so perfect that I shudder to point out Shakespeare’s flaws. Sometimes, I do wonder: what if Lady M had committed the murder herself? But then, the story would be completely different.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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I played Goneril when I was younger and would love to play her when I am a little older. I would love to play Kate in <i>Taming of The Shrew</i> or Portia in <i>Julius Caesar</i>. And, now that I am working on <i>Macbeth</i>, I think to play Macbeth himself would be an incredibly fruitful challenge. His arc is just so epic and lush. I love the idea of a Queen Lear, like Glenda Jackson’s, when I am of age and have the life experience to fully understand the breadth of Lear’s deterioration. And of course, I could spend the next twenty years still trying to unpack the puzzle of Lady M herself.<br />
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<b><a href="http://frogandpeachtheatre.org/" target="_blank">Frog & Peach</a>'s <i>Macbeth</i> runs from January 19 to February 12 at the Sheen Center for Thought and Culture in the East Village. Tickets are $25.</b></div>
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<b>headshot</b> Laura Rose Photography</div>
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<b>photos</b> Paul Greco</div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-87323748391350254352017-01-23T11:00:00.000-05:002017-04-01T08:11:48.628-04:00Women in Shakespeare: Jade Anouka as Ariel<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJqNNvP2Xqod0579EawzCP-hfYzXjf5L69cBLAT-H22dNdbLeXcO1bhi1szIIH8ERBqhbmc-5GKr5uUhSVhZKnE2kU6e9CamIG8JP253PkNF7kqPuGMapSQgb3Biz-UmUklkLd37hGj5A/s1600/Tempest+-+Donmar+-+headshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJqNNvP2Xqod0579EawzCP-hfYzXjf5L69cBLAT-H22dNdbLeXcO1bhi1szIIH8ERBqhbmc-5GKr5uUhSVhZKnE2kU6e9CamIG8JP253PkNF7kqPuGMapSQgb3Biz-UmUklkLd37hGj5A/s320/Tempest+-+Donmar+-+headshot.jpg" width="226" /></a><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.jadeanouka.com/" target="_blank">Jade Anouka</a> has taken </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">a central role in Phyllida Lloyd's Shakespeare trilogy. She took over as Marc Antony last year after appearing as Calpurnia in <i>Julius Caesar</i> (NY '13), and she stood out as a tender Hotspur in <i>Henry 4.1 </i>(NY '15). In the third production, set as before in a women's prison, </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Anouka plays Ariel to Harriet Walters' Prospero. Ms. Anouka emailed with me about her roles in the all-female company.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Ariel. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Firstly I don’t see Ariel as 'her', he was written male, but I just try and play the scenes, play the intentions of the character and not focus on genderizing Ariel. I found the desperation of Ariel for freedom and liberty is what drives him throughout the play. He is fulfilling these tasks for Prospero happily, but only because if he does it well Propero has promised him his freedom and soon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Ariel gets my favorite stage direction in all of Shakespeare: <i>[Re-enter Ariel, invisible…]</i>. How do you and Lloyd stage that? More generally, how is the magic of the role (and play) treated, especially given the vivid reality of the jailhouse setting?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Haha yes! As you say the prison setting could restrict us in someways as to plausible theatrical effects... but then again it opens us up to the real magic of theatre... of make-believe... of pretending. I love the youthful idea of how invisibility is realised in our production. When Ariel is invisible nobody looks at him. It's been funny where fellow cast members have forgotten I'm on stage in some scenes because they have invested so much into pretending they can't see me that they start believing it!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>By framing the trilogy with the setting of a women’s prison, Ms. Lloyd doesn’t simply ignore her actors’ gender. How does this complex approach to gender and sexuality affect your performance of Ariel?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I honestly don’t think about it. I don’t try and be a boy, I don’t [try] and be feminine, whatever that means, I just play the character of Ariel, use what Shakespeare has wrote and what I find interesting to serve the production. Also we are all playing inmates playing characters, so my prison character, Sade, affects how I play Ariel. Sexuality on the other hand is something entirely different. I don’t think we have had an approach to sexuality with these plays. People may have made judgments about our characters' sexuality but it's not something that affects the work I don’t think.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>You’ve appeared in all three plays of Lloyd’s Shakespeare Trilogy. What similarities have you noticed between Marc Antony, Hotspur, and Ariel? How have you approached Ariel differently in rehearsal?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Sade is what links them, they are all played by the same prisoner. All three are very determined characters. All three are charismatic and successful in getting people to follow them. Anthony gets all of Rome to do a 180 and believe in him, Hotspur rallies armies to fight on his side against the odds and Ariel uses magic to get anyone to do, well, anything. In rehearsal there was lots of discussion about how Sade might want to represent magic [as] what feels like freedom to her. The movement/dance/song/rapping came from that idea.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>How does the Lloyd’s rehearsal approach and aesthetic of the Shakespeare Trilogy fit with other Shakespeare you’ve worked on?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Phyllida is very inclusive, rehearsals are collaborative and every voice is heard. It's also very playful and very thorough. I have been in quite a few Shakespeare plays and no two rehearsal approaches have been the same. I've done very 'traditional' productions at the Globe, I've done very minimalist arty productions at the RSC, productions with only 'two planks and a passion', with directors who are unashamedly strict with the iambic verse & those less so. What I love about doing Shakespeare is that the plays stand. The stories always hold up. But what I really love about this Trilogy work with Phyllida is that those stories can now include me and people who look like me. It has shown how Shakespeare and Theatre is, can be and must be non exclusive.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his parts for women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">He has some great parts for women. But there is definitely not enough of them. I have loved playing Ophelia, Juliet, Olivia in the past. But when I got to speak Mark Antony and Hotspur I was like wow this is awesome stuff. The boys have been having all the real fun! I don’t think they know how lucky they are. These roles are meaty, powerful, complicated and big. Shakespeare wrote in a very different time to now, women's roles in society were not what they are now. Assuming his works reflected the world he lived in then we need to bring it up to date. His words are great which is why his plays live on and people keep producing them. But if we do we must move with the times too. The good women's roles run out quickly and so we are taking on the men's now too. What new things can we discover by playing... Surely that’s what theatre is all about....?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Hamlet. I played Ophelia at the Globe in London and absolutely loved it. But when I was backstage listening to Hamlet I couldn’t help thinking how great his speeches are and how honest the character's reactions to an awful series of events are. Hamlet is young and going through a hard time there is something we can all relate to in that. Male, female, black, white, gay, straight. It's so human. I wanna give him a go!</span></div>
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<b><a href="https://www.donmarwarehouse.com/" target="_blank">The Donmar Warehouse</a>'s <i>The Tempest</i> runs from January 13 to February 19 at <a href="http://stannswarehouse.org/" target="_blank">St. Ann's Warehouse</a> in DUMBO. Tickets are $40-$90.</b></div>
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<b>headshot</b> Donmar Warehouse</div>
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-->Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-39934873018880082302016-11-28T11:00:00.000-05:002016-11-28T12:23:56.729-05:00Women in Shakespeare: Joy Richardson as Paulina<div class="m_-817041635753456845s4" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;">
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<b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5b_-FHvLYP5U8HYX_uijBYw6gCCUQtlilTl3bi0SxWgfzz0AFe1pbtZ5k0Ql-kt9Y16dmK66xGXUHarTG6RZkCNlfcZzVCXMSOPIT0C69Gi4wi3P1jOUFuUVwq6Re0SLUkAzXeZFgMhk/s1600/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Cheek+by+Jowl+at+BAM+-+headshot.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5b_-FHvLYP5U8HYX_uijBYw6gCCUQtlilTl3bi0SxWgfzz0AFe1pbtZ5k0Ql-kt9Y16dmK66xGXUHarTG6RZkCNlfcZzVCXMSOPIT0C69Gi4wi3P1jOUFuUVwq6Re0SLUkAzXeZFgMhk/s320/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Cheek+by+Jowl+at+BAM+-+headshot.jpg" /></a><b>Joy Richardson has worked for over two decades in London's theater. Her big break, at the National, was in a controversial Pericles under the direction of Phyllida Lloyd. Since then, she's played many classic and modern roles, at the National, Shakespeare's Globe, on the West End, and in global tours. Now she's visiting NYC with Cheek by Jowl's <i>Winter's Tale</i>. She's cast as Paulina for the second time, having once played the part at the Globe's inaugural season in 1997. Ms. Richardson emailed with me about the role and other Shakespearean parts for women.</b></div>
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<b>Let’s start with Paulina. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</b></div>
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Paulina is a fascinating character to play. She goes on a huge learning curve throughout the play. When we first meet Paulina, she appears out of nowhere, at a time of great crisis in the kingdom. In trying to make things better, she challenges the most powerful authorities in the land: the King and all his nobles. As terrifying as the consequences might be, she risks her life to do what she believes is right and just. Justice is at the core of her values, and what gives her the strength of her convictions, while others falter.</div>
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Paulina's scenes are all challenging to play, in different ways. She is an isolated figure most of the time. It is often her against the world. Her weapons are words, and her ability to constantly adapt, and so survive. All the while being constantly forced to justify her actions. She has to persuade the men, that she, a woman, knows best, and that good will come of all the years of suffering she puts the King through.</div>
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<b>What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8E28Bvxy-BqBx-Gy8R1HePte7pTHB64UDpv9vzl3Uhdn9tKSiYOcsp64O8G4WdWFwgo9b9Frzr5wC4gOnYuDW8wWmEclK5Mo0XAX9afSZBG05p921maD6e6LkTQhbQxUnth6WH6rjLLA/s1600/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Cheek+by+Jowl+at+BAM+-+photo+3.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8E28Bvxy-BqBx-Gy8R1HePte7pTHB64UDpv9vzl3Uhdn9tKSiYOcsp64O8G4WdWFwgo9b9Frzr5wC4gOnYuDW8wWmEclK5Mo0XAX9afSZBG05p921maD6e6LkTQhbQxUnth6WH6rjLLA/s320/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Cheek+by+Jowl+at+BAM+-+photo+3.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Richardson as Paulina</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">in Cheek by Jowl's Winter's Tale</span></div>
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The tricky thing for me is that we know very little about Paulina's past life. Even her present personal life is a mystery. But as an actor you cannot leave that aspect of her blank. The little scraps of detail have to be used as the foundation to create a fully rounded human being. Someone with hopes, fears and a detailed history. Otherwise you can so easily make her a mouthy, two dimensional know-it-all. Paulina's is so much more than that. It is a challenge, but fun having that much scope for invention.</div>
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<b>Many of Shakespeare’s strong women are a political type—Lady Macbeth, Cleopatra, Margaret, Lear’s daughters. How does Paulina fit with those characters?</b></div>
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Paulina is a very political animal. She sees the politics in everything. And is brave enough to be visible, even in the face of great danger to herself and her family. In her society, men rule women. It is the men who are appointed to positions of power. And it is with great political skill that she navigates this. It requires great political skill on her part to gain the influence she does, and maintain that power and influence in the face of constant criticism and attempts to undermine her.</div>
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<b>Where does her power lie?</b></div>
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<br /></div>
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This production explores the psychology of power. Power misused and the different ways people respond to the horrendous choices facing them. The struggle with their own values. 'What are you willing to sacrifice for your beliefs?' is the question running throughout the play. Paulina's power lies in the strength of her belief in a better future. She has hope in the future. And she believes she has a crucial role to play to make it happen. Her conviction and self-belief allows her to take a leap of faith, and forces others to do the same.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>On an intersecting subject, how does Shakespeare's perspective on Paulina's age affect his portrait of her?</b></div>
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One thing about Paulina is that her beauty and sexuality are not an issue in the play. It is what she says and does that carry weight. This is very unusual in a major female character in a Shakespeare play. When we first meet Paulina, she asks questions, speaks her mind, and publicly condemns all those who do not meet her moral standards. But as the years pass, she is less confrontational and more passive aggressive. She speaks less, but is just as effective. Her determination is still there, and her power has grown. Physically she is weaker, as the years have taken their toll. She has sacrificed everything for what she believes. Age has imbued her with a different kind of energy and determination. She is older, wiser, and has an iron will.</div>
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<b>You’ve played Paulina before, at Shakespeare’s Globe in 1997. How has your perspective on the role changed in twenty years?</b></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4d1xvdBpgIA1vAm5x5h7H7GMZc3cOHo-K70BxODPb9CHNS1_0hXgWFcmeFMPz72eY0hy2JGN18Pnu28JeAa4IMGHW6P-8sRxhMMxogq1FhY0guzQiBWxAM3Cy-HtnGZgIHgqeuljYOsc/s1600/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Globe+1997.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4d1xvdBpgIA1vAm5x5h7H7GMZc3cOHo-K70BxODPb9CHNS1_0hXgWFcmeFMPz72eY0hy2JGN18Pnu28JeAa4IMGHW6P-8sRxhMMxogq1FhY0guzQiBWxAM3Cy-HtnGZgIHgqeuljYOsc/s320/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Globe+1997.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Richardson as Paulina</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">at Shakespeare's Globe, 1997</span></div>
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The Paulina I played twenty years ago was completely different to the Paulina I play now. This has largely to do with the company I am working with now, but also because the world is a very different place. Extraordinary events have happened that have left their trace. The certainty I had then seems so naive now. I am twenty years older and I have a whole bundle of new questions to throw at Paulina, along with the previous questions. This Paulina has a tougher job to do in facing down her own demons, before she can deal with other people's demons. But she also has many more strings to her bow. She feels the weight of responsibility for consequences of her actions, but going backwards is not an option. Many things can, and do go wrong, and she is more aware of the possibility of failure.</div>
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<b>How does the approach and aesthetic of Cheek by Jowl fit with other Shakespeare you’ve worked on, at Shakespeare’s Globe and elsewhere?</b></div>
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Working for Cheek by Jowl is an education. An opportunity to learn and break old habits. To step outside your comfort zone. It is an amazing company of hugely talented individuals who bring their unique skills and passion to enable actors to tell a story so that it matters. The actor is put at the very centre of every production. And as storytellers, we are continually stretched in new and interesting ways. Focus is also placed on the dynamics of space and time. The space must live, so the word, and the story can be born. Rehearsals continue throughout the run of the show. This is a luxury. With other companies rehearsals end once a show has officially opened. This opportunity to continuously explore the text and make new choices is a rare thing in the world of theatre.</div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, in your career you’ve played a variety of his roles, male and female. What’s your perspective on his parts for women?</b></div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
One exciting aspect of doing a Shakespeare play is his understanding of humanity. Strengths and weaknesses. His characters are multilayered, with endless possibilities for interpretation. Both male and female. The difference between them is the different rules and expectations imposed on them by society. The men are often the protagonists. The movers and shakers. While the women must find endless ways of challenging the restrictions put on them. Sometimes they succeed in their aims and other times, they do not. But there is a whole world that lies in between.</div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<b>Where are his strengths in depicting them and where are his weaknesses?</b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr5qdVDM48QpRBmf62wY6NMRyIkjBnWjEwYxmvXM2irCQNkCDLJhjXfbKiP1g2Tl3vZBY9QlViDjbPhP20zc2_1UvfrB6OU-h6SHxuhC-txM0PyAId1U70lviWRlHh9ZfMHRxTttJGDYw/s1600/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Cheek+by+Jowl+at+BAM+-+photo+1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr5qdVDM48QpRBmf62wY6NMRyIkjBnWjEwYxmvXM2irCQNkCDLJhjXfbKiP1g2Tl3vZBY9QlViDjbPhP20zc2_1UvfrB6OU-h6SHxuhC-txM0PyAId1U70lviWRlHh9ZfMHRxTttJGDYw/s320/Winter%2527s+Tale+-+Cheek+by+Jowl+at+BAM+-+photo+1.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Richardson (second from right) with the women</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">of Cheek by Jowl's Winter's Tale</span></div>
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Shakespeare gives a voice to those facing the injustices of the world. He also gives a voice to the perpetrators of injustice. The argument is never simplistic. So, for an actor, there is a danger in wanting the women to be heroines of our times. Wanting them to be good role models and expecting them to display the values we admire. That is why a play like <i>The Taming of the Shrew</i> is often seen as a “problem play”. At the end of the play, our “heroine” delivers a speech that embraces the very values that enslaves women. This is unpalatable for modern audiences, yet it is a reality that exists now. The spirit of the downtrodden are sometimes broken. After a long battle, her spirit appears to be broken. The play explores uncomfortable truths, using humour. When we laugh we feel complicit. The easy way out is to deliver her final speech ironically. As is often done. Racism, sexism and antisemitism are expressed by characters in the play, but I cannot recall anything in Shakespeare's plays that are beyond salvaging. That perspective misses the point. Exploring these themes is an opportunity to find the depth of what it is to be human.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
I have always wanted to play Lady Macbeth and Juliet. They do say that by the time you are experienced enough to play Juliet, you are far too old for the part. But why give up on dreams? Prospero and Richard III are also characters I would love to play.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><a href="http://www.cheekbyjowl.com/">Cheek by Jowl</a>'s The Winter's Tale runs from December 6 to 11 at the BAM Harvey Theater in Fort Greene. Tickets are $25-$110.</b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<b>headshot</b> Ric Bacon</div>
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<b>Cheek by Jowl photos</b> Johan Persson</div>
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<b>Globe '97 photo</b> UPPA/Photoshot</div>
</span>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-65982525062256368982016-11-21T11:00:00.000-05:002016-11-22T17:18:16.306-05:00Women on Shakespeare: Emily Young on The Servant of Two Masters<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIiH_rYEhX3-HTHkSAid2OteInfVUjvSXB9ARN9DEHCrgvc5_nJHJzxfPc_sE-AAGHZ0bPTRnfsW4i1oStNBRz2RiX1UeFuGE16XPvZq_gSogSeF57_7LHl9AiYHKxdPfYIeAgLwVeGuA/s1600/Goldoni+-+TFANA+-+headshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIiH_rYEhX3-HTHkSAid2OteInfVUjvSXB9ARN9DEHCrgvc5_nJHJzxfPc_sE-AAGHZ0bPTRnfsW4i1oStNBRz2RiX1UeFuGE16XPvZq_gSogSeF57_7LHl9AiYHKxdPfYIeAgLwVeGuA/s1600/Goldoni+-+TFANA+-+headshot.jpg" /></a></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">As a member of the Fiasco Theater, Emily Young has helped to revitalize Shakespearean staging in NYC. This month, </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Ms. Young returns to Theater for a New Audience without her colleagues, collaborating instead with Christopher Bayes and Steven Epp. These two illustrious comedians ground their work in the tradition of <i>commedia dell'arte</i>, a semi-improvisational approach that influenced Shakespeare, Moliére, and all Europe for centuries. Carlo Goldoni, an 18th-century Italian, supplies the scenario for their production. Ms. Young emailed with me to discuss her work in <i>commedia</i> and Shakespeare.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #222222;"><br /></span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #222222;">Let’s start with Goldoni and <i>The Servant of
Two Masters</i>. Can you tell me a little about what you love in the play?</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I love this family of artists. This is one of the most alive,
fun-loving, silly, caring group of artists I have come across. Especially this
week I have felt so lucky to be a part of this group of comedy experts with
unflappable spirits.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I can</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">’t imagine going
through what we went through culturally last week without the true gift of
coming to work and being given permission to laugh and trying to offer
permission to the audience to do the same. I will never forget trying to listen
to the audience’s needs the day after the election. It felt like real purpose
to be in a comedy. The fact that it’s a comedy that dates back to 1748, with
origins as far back as Rome and that it can speak to an audience today is
astonishing.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">That’s one of the reasons I love to do
Shakespeare as well. I live for the moment an audience laughs at something so
immediately in a play written hundreds of years ago. In that moment we’re not
only connected to each other in the room but across time as well. And it is a
salve.</span></span></div>
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<b><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">In what way?</span></span></b></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I will echo what our director told us
the day after the election. When many hearts were feeling broken and spirits
were dashed, he told us that our jobs had changed overnight, </span><span lang="DE" style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Our
role as artists has changed today” he said, </span><span lang="DE" style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We are
no longer provocateurs, but healers; and that is a beautiful responsibility.”</span></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span lang="IT" style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span lang="IT" style="color: #222222;">Goldoni</span></b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;">’s dramaturgy grew out of the improvisation and stock characters
of commedia dell’arte. How do you bring to life a stock character like
Smeraldina?</span></b></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Young with Steven Epp<br />in <i>The Servant of Two Masters</i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">It</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s a 'healthy' challenge!
By which I mean it’s an enormous challenge. I feel a type of exposure in this
process that I haven’t felt in a while. We jumped right into rehearsing on our
feet which meant that I had to dive in to the deep end of discovering
Smeraldina physically. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">It</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s super-challenging to
try to keep up with the tradition of the form of the stock characters — the
behavior, rhythm, physicality and sound, and figure out how to bring yourself
to it authentically. I’m not so concerned with putting a signature stamp on it
or anything — only that, if you just do the form there’s no truth in it and if
all you do is your own truth it’s not the character, or the tradition. It’s a
practice that can't be rushed.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">One of the biggest gifts of the process has been to
reconnect with the pursuit of the actor</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s
pleasure onstage and for an audience. That simple objective can be lost in the
shuffle and it’s of utmost importance now. Chris reminded me to play at the
speed of fun which I couldn’t believe I had forgotten. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-size: small;">Could you tell me about</span></span></b><span style="font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #222222;"> Christopher Bayes' approach to clowning? How has your training with him prepared you for a role like Smeraldina?</span></b><b><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">I studied with Chris at Brown/Trinity Rep (known as the
Brown/Trinity Consortium then). He was one of the main reasons I went back to
my alma mater for my MFA. He had just become the head of the movement program
at B/T. I had heard so much about him. When I studied with him second year it
really changed everything. My general approach to acting changed: what it
means to stand in front of an audience, what it means to be in the room, now. He
introduced me to the </span><span style="color: #222222;">“speed of fun,” “being
faster than your worry,” “louder than your critic.” These are incredibly
profound proposals for an actor. He had us living on the edge of our own
presence — and I found when I brought that to written material, it changed the
whole ballgame. Sometimes I go into the next room and meow and moo in cat/cow
positions (a warmup he gave us) to get out of my head and back in the mood (no
pun intended).</span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxJqV7uE4bs5vO3IE2EeH_PuE3mc37UFdpRwsHVY2EV906oSKhsqfkLT36XDBV9z7c_cS_LxWyzx4IRckelwN9lHJwjggpV0fgrm9JVvE4pX-aRXg64fIhQVVp-M7QY2Aj6wSU91KseF4/s1600/Goldoni+-+TFANA+-+photo+3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxJqV7uE4bs5vO3IE2EeH_PuE3mc37UFdpRwsHVY2EV906oSKhsqfkLT36XDBV9z7c_cS_LxWyzx4IRckelwN9lHJwjggpV0fgrm9JVvE4pX-aRXg64fIhQVVp-M7QY2Aj6wSU91KseF4/s320/Goldoni+-+TFANA+-+photo+3.JPG" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Young with director Christopher Bayes<br />in rehearsals for <i>The Servant of Two Masters</i></span></td></tr>
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<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">[Chris] keeps reminding us of the wonderful responsibility to
bring joy, pleasure, and fun to an audience and that can only happen if we goof
around and delight in each other. And then my friend and colleague Andy
Grotelueschen, (who plays Dottore) says, </span><span style="color: #222222;">“We
can only get off if they get off.” It’s thrilling and delightful to try to get
them off… er, you know what I mean. So there really is a symbiotic relationship
with everyone in the room.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;"></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;"><b>What tricks of the trade have you picked up from Steven Epp?</b></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">Steven is a marvel. I can breathe when I</span><span style="color: #222222;">’m acting with him. He has such ease and yet his mind works with
such alacrity at the same time. There’s something peaceful and yet highly
provocative at the same time. He always seems to be working on the play —
thinking about new jokes that might tickle an audience, new references to
current events which might provoke thought or add some amount of catharsis to
an audience. He is rigorous in his fun. And then he lets go and surprises himself
as well, I think. I don’t know how he does it. But I’m certainly taking notes.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #222222;">What links have you found between Goldoni and
Shakespeare?</span></b></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">Everything is everything. It</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s
all one, man. </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">They are both so rich. So fun. So much scope. So physical.</span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">How do their views of comedy differ?</span></span></b></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">The main difference is how language functions. The
language in Goldoni</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s play is flexible and
serves the heightened physicality of the piece. When a <i>lazzo</i> comes (an
improvised bit), it’s really flexible and alive — there’s danger in the freedom
of it. It changes every night. Even when the text is fixed, it’s still serving
whatever is happening in the room at that very moment, and the spirit or
potential for improv is always there.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">In </span><span style="color: #222222;">Shakespeare the language
<i>is </i>the physicality of the piece. The language is what is happening: it’s
rough, poetic, it’s everything. When something gets in the way of that the play
sort of stops happening.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigp9zjA94G2TyWnF9OqOcdN8Z8LVXNTiASOsecBBsIU3ftrjClsMbwTFSqyVONqVSKY-traEGFYvTeyysTw30MGDbHvbLlsfuCCaMdJ-gDuu7CC0Mk-FZQ6G0hhKJRH94WrgIfWh1D_BU/s1600/Goldoni+-+TFANA+-+photo+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="294" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigp9zjA94G2TyWnF9OqOcdN8Z8LVXNTiASOsecBBsIU3ftrjClsMbwTFSqyVONqVSKY-traEGFYvTeyysTw30MGDbHvbLlsfuCCaMdJ-gDuu7CC0Mk-FZQ6G0hhKJRH94WrgIfWh1D_BU/s320/Goldoni+-+TFANA+-+photo+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Young as Smeraldina<br />in TFANA's <i>The Servant of Two Masters</i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">But what</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s amazing about
these immortal writers of theater is in content, they all seem to get what a “mixed
up, muddled up, shook up, world” we’re living in (why The Kinks here, now? not
sure). Both Shakespeare and Goldoni are diving deep into the mess it is to be
human, the stupidity and the idiocy, the beauty, the boldness.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #222222;">How do you grapple with the ingrained
sexism of those pre-modern plays?</span></b><b><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">One of the reasons this version of </span><i><span style="color: #222222;">Servant </span></i><span style="color: #222222;">is so exciting and
provocative is that it's up-to-date. So we have references to the current
political climate, the election, pop culture, and public figures. It’s already
a delightful surprise and a catharsis to acknowledge the political moment in a
classical play, but this week it has also brought a lot of relief to me. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">Smeraldina has a monologue in the piece written in the
sixteenth century about the injustice of the double standard between the way
women are treated and the way men are treated in society regarding infidelity. She
goes on to say that it is because, </span><span style="color: #222222;">“The
law was made made by men, and that whenever a woman does anything the man has
the law to punish her,” and that’s unfair. We added some contemporary
references in it including Pussy Riot lyrics and a recent battle cry of
feminists at the end. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">What other ways has the political climate influenced the show?</span></b></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">The night before the election the ladies in the cast
cooked up a surprise during that monologue: I hid an </span><span style="color: #222222;">“I’m with her,” sign under my apron and Adina and Liz came out
with signs for Hilary and Jill Stein. It was such a unique thrill to get to
voice real views in the middle of the play with fun and passion and surprise. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">It was an experience I</span><span style="color: #222222;">’ll
never forget, as was the experience I had the day after Hilary lost. That was a
hard and disappointing day for Hilary supporters, and here I had the opportunity
to speak feminist language in a group of New Yorkers. It was a tangible
responsibility and an opportunity. We didn’t have to change a thing about the
monologue written in the 16th century for it to be 100% relevant in that room. It
taught me about acting: the material is always relevant because history repeats
itself and human beings need to talk about it together out of doors.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">The fact that a play from the 18th century is affording
that opportunity today is affirming, encouraging and mind-blowing.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-size: small;">You’ve got plenty of experience with Shakespearean theater, most notably with the Fiasco Theater. What’s your perspective on female roles before, say, Ibsen?</span></span></b></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAm4pscfr6UH8pN8xkQZ5qRQcwSVZeDuSS4m-_NvimPcw2udbnq3M5cVY8N-H907S-GNYRx9xyNZRWzLaYuy4fhAnxdszO3x6LjzEmf8oJNC8FyQKqnFG0itBBNuulXTEqNWvVKJwTAVc/s1600/Two+Gents+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0Fiasco+-+photo+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAm4pscfr6UH8pN8xkQZ5qRQcwSVZeDuSS4m-_NvimPcw2udbnq3M5cVY8N-H907S-GNYRx9xyNZRWzLaYuy4fhAnxdszO3x6LjzEmf8oJNC8FyQKqnFG0itBBNuulXTEqNWvVKJwTAVc/s320/Two+Gents+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0Fiasco+-+photo+1.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Young as Sylvia in Fiasco's<br /><i>Two Gentlemen of Verona</i>(2015)</span></td></tr>
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<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">To offer the other side, often with classical plays, and
definitely in Shakespeare, you can feel the playwright</span><span style="color: #222222;">’s heartfelt understanding of their female characters’ perspectives
and then not being able to follow-through dramaturgically, because of their
times. In Fiasco, when we run up against this challenge, we try to do our best
to trust that the writer knew what he or she (usually he) was doing, but was
constrained. We try to trust Shakespeare through thick and thin, and come up
with an interpretation or experience of playing the roles that makes sense to
us today.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">It gets hard to fully commit to that idea in
something like <i>The Two Gentlemen of Verona</i>, which we did at TFANA last
year, when two men are fighting over one woman. At the dramatic climax of
the play, the two men forgive each other but don’t consult the woman about her
experience. We wrestled over how to deal with this and I think we did a good
job with it. I hope we did justice by wrestling with the problem without
changing the language. We did our best to put that process of grappling on
stage through our delivery as actors. But audiences of today had really
strong reactions to the end of that play and I get it.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><span style="color: #222222;">What are you working on next, on your own and
with Fiasco?</span></b></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">This Spring Fiasco is slated to do </span><i><span style="color: #222222;">The Imaginary Invalid,</span></i><span style="color: #222222;"> by
Moliere, at The Old Globe in San Diego. I will playing Toinette, the maid. I’m
even more intrigued to work on it because of <i>Servant </i>and playing
Smeraldina. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-size: small;">Do you have any particular Shakespearean roles you’d love to play? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</span></span></b></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">I</span><span style="color: #222222;">’d love to play Beatrice
from <i>Much Ado</i> one day. </span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">I</span><span style="color: #222222;">’ve begun to dream about
playing Hal from <i>Henry IV, 1 and 2</i>.</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsbX-hRoCJm2zjw1BJUS7Ybyzkd2Nr1iJBhgYYmUM-2LCHoCM47MwsarcLPk00Nomzti-1jRjm-bFePeeDXCbnsGt2X71HK-94PPfvU2-_Ct-qA6vaOXsP6Hdj4iGjpL4mTJDsynzUMME/s1600/Cymbeline+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0Fiasco+%25E2%2580%2593+photo+1.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsbX-hRoCJm2zjw1BJUS7Ybyzkd2Nr1iJBhgYYmUM-2LCHoCM47MwsarcLPk00Nomzti-1jRjm-bFePeeDXCbnsGt2X71HK-94PPfvU2-_Ct-qA6vaOXsP6Hdj4iGjpL4mTJDsynzUMME/s320/Cymbeline+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0Fiasco+%25E2%2580%2593+photo+1.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Young (center) as Belaria<br />in Fiasco's <i>Cymbeline</i> (2012)</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #222222;">And when I was playing Belarius from </span><i><span style="color: #222222;">Cymbeline </span></i><span style="color: #222222;">as a female
character, Belaria, I used to daydream about speaking the Duke’s text from <i>As
You Like It. </i>There’s something that I can’t get enough of, when a character
leaves the court and moves to the woods. The language about nature and what it
does to a person gets me. Whenever I feel like running away or escaping I think
of these images. Of course the Duke isn’t on vacation. He’s exiled. Which I
would prefer not to be. There’s work to be done. But here it is for your brief
escape:</span><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Now, my co-mates and brothers in exile, </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
</span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Than that of painted pomp? Are not these
woods</span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">More free from peril than the envious court? </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Here feel we not the penalty of Adam, </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">The seasons' difference; as the icy fang </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">And churlish chiding of the winter's wind, </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Which when it bites and blows upon my body,</span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say
</span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">'This is no flattery; these are counsellors </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">That feelingly persuade me what I am.' </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Sweet are the uses of adversity, </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,</span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Wears yet a precious jewel in his head; </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">And this our life, exempt from public haunt, </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Finds tongues in trees, books in the running
brooks, </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Sermons in stones, and good in everything. </span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<!--EndFragment--><div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">I would not change it.</span></i><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b>-----</b></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><br /></b></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><a href="http://www.tfana.org/" target="_blank">TFANA</a>'s <i>The Servant of Two Masters</i> runs from November 6 to December 4 at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center in Fort Greene. Tickets are $65-$95.</b></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b>-----</b></span></span></div>
<div class="Default" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b>photos</b> Gerry Goodstein</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: small;"><b><i>Two Gents</i> photo</b> Theresa Wood</span></span></div>
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-->Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-30318532502857196362016-11-03T11:00:00.000-04:002016-11-20T21:33:29.181-05:00Women on Shakespeare: Lisa Harrow on Volumnia<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</span></b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi_yjAOHCjJINQVXYTjmNBY1HHt2X4wtiiqLaDaKZgnlNpPObdeQYhtoUUR3HMpAgdTcp74jB5xFdzuJc-IB85H-t9k8aS0c6lAlPvlebtN_hWzK4ljwT5DG0K-LP05uzzxn9QOeDpuwk/s1600/Coriolanus+-+Red+Bull+-+headshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi_yjAOHCjJINQVXYTjmNBY1HHt2X4wtiiqLaDaKZgnlNpPObdeQYhtoUUR3HMpAgdTcp74jB5xFdzuJc-IB85H-t9k8aS0c6lAlPvlebtN_hWzK4ljwT5DG0K-LP05uzzxn9QOeDpuwk/s320/Coriolanus+-+Red+Bull+-+headshot.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div>
<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This fall, the Red Bull mounts a modern-dress <i>Coriolanus</i> with Lisa Harrow as the redoubtable Volumnia, mother to the titular general. A native New Zealander, Harrow has worked extensively around the world for almost five decades. Her Olivia fell in love with Judi Dench's Viola in a legendary <i>Twelfth Night</i> at the RSC in 1969. Six years later, she played Juliet to John Hurt's Romeo when both were in their thirties. Though it doesn't come up in our email conversation, Harrow is also an environmental activist who wrote <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/What-Can-Do-Alphabet-Living/dp/1931498660" target="_blank">What Can I Do? An Alphabet for Living</a></i>.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Let’s start with Volumnia. What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">My thoughts about Volumnia evolved as the production took shape. I am the mother of a solo child, a son, who started life without a father in the home. So I was particularly interested in the dynamic of Volumnia and Coriolanus, given the fact that there is no mention of his father anywhere in the text. I strove to find a gentler, nurturing side of her, which was the kind of mother I hope I was with my boy. But in the end, I realized I had to bow to Shakespeare’s writing and embody his vision of Volumnia as a powerfully ambitious woman who molded her boy to her vision of what a man should be: a great soldier and a powerful political leader.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The placing of the play in a contemporary American context added an extra complexity to the question of who Volumnia is, especially considering that Coriolanus is played by the wonderful Trinidadian Canadian actor, Dion Johnstone. So it’s clear that Coriolanus’s father was not a white patrician. I decided that Volumnia, an independent woman not interested in marriage but wanting a son to mould into a leader, chose to find a specific sperm donor to give her that son. Of course, this has no expression in the play, but I needed to find a back-story that made sense to me.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Which of her scenes are the most challenging?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I find her first scene (1.3) the most challenging because the stark bareness of the stage provides no domestic setting which is implicit in the writing. But once that scene is over, the rest of her story is clear and wonderful to play. Shakespeare leaves no knots to untangle. The play ends in the inevitable death of Coriolanus and Volumnia is left with the tragic knowledge that her fierce framing of her son’s character results in life without that beloved son.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefcgLdo1_GeWy8nNemifoRDlrdkIiyDHaQYFSPIkFzSU0Hx5so0v2hWShvkMnvsn6gCLSDRBbf2HFcr-GeEh0VpXBmc_HrOvNcH17SCDTw6KHy9qrKadGhzhHFtgIfXYbH-7o9Gfo-U0/s1600/Coriolanus+-+Red+Bull+-+photo+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefcgLdo1_GeWy8nNemifoRDlrdkIiyDHaQYFSPIkFzSU0Hx5so0v2hWShvkMnvsn6gCLSDRBbf2HFcr-GeEh0VpXBmc_HrOvNcH17SCDTw6KHy9qrKadGhzhHFtgIfXYbH-7o9Gfo-U0/s320/Coriolanus+-+Red+Bull+-+photo+2.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Harrow with Dion Johnstone as Coriolanus</span></td></tr>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Volumnia is one of Shakespeare’s most powerful women, socially as well as psychologically. How does the play present that power, as compared with Lady Macbeth, Cleopatra, and Lear’s daughters?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is a complicated question that I’m not sure I can answer easily. Volumnia is indeed powerful, but only to her son. She holds no political power, which is probably why she’s driven her son to a military career. Or did she? Perhaps he was a born soldier and her desire to gain social standing drives her to capitalize on his military success and push him into seeking political power so she could bask in reflected glory. There’s no answer in the text to either of those questions, just her words and actions, which all point to her ambition that is at odds with his, and his inability to strongly oppose her. He could have left home years ago and made his own way, but he hasn’t.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Lady Macbeth, Cleopatra, and Lear’s daughters are all members of a ruling class in no uncertain terms. Cleopatra’s power over Antony is sexual; Lady Macbeth’s power is that of a woman wanting her husband to be king and who will sacrifice her female nature (i.e. compassion and nurture) to help him achieve that and is driven mad by the consequences of that wish, so her power wanes quickly; and Lear’s daughters are the product of an abusive father and their power is driven by the anger engendered by that abuse.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">She’s the only mother on that list — how does that figure in?</span></b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I have no answer to that except to say that clearly Shakespeare is interested in the psychology of this particular son/mother relationship. How far can an ambitious, smart mother, who has no opportunity in her world to realize her own ambitions, so influence and frame her son that he provides her with the satisfaction of her own success through his triumphs?</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Talking about Shakespeare more generally, in your career you’ve played a variety of parts. What’s your perspective on his roles for women?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When I was at high school in New Zealand, I played all the boy’s parts. It’s one of the joys of going to an all-girls’ school, the ones with the loudest voices get all the juicy swashbuckling parts to play, and my two special ones were King Lear and Henry V. I still yearn to have another go at Henry, but the attempt at Lear gave me the nearest thing to a nervous breakdown I’ve ever had.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8yzDmQY2Hn1CEMZarPuCVECj0IgFzL_WRdN9DIzYUdYnckQG8uncDCSAQi448Qmn9rXvhNqrOCBurg1SN8q6pKQ_4kPL9m_nsC19zwF_2DnDojg4sIUNsuTPzZZVColU-Fedrl_rkznw/s1600/Twelfth+Night+-+RSC+1969+-+J.+Dench+%2526+L.+Harrow.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8yzDmQY2Hn1CEMZarPuCVECj0IgFzL_WRdN9DIzYUdYnckQG8uncDCSAQi448Qmn9rXvhNqrOCBurg1SN8q6pKQ_4kPL9m_nsC19zwF_2DnDojg4sIUNsuTPzZZVColU-Fedrl_rkznw/s400/Twelfth+Night+-+RSC+1969+-+J.+Dench+%2526+L.+Harrow.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Harrow's Ophelia with Judi Dench as Viola<br />RSC 1969, director John Barton</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>What did you learn by playing those parts?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What I discovered by playing male roles was what I called “male mental space” — that is, that the world of male ideas and the physical world of male characters were so much more thrilling and huge and extraordinary than that of female characters. It was a world that was much more exciting to inhabit if you were a tomboy. But, when I joined the RSC in 1969 to play Olivia in <i>Twelfth Night</i>, I found myself working with John Barton, who is considered to be among the greatest directors to work with on a Shakespearean script and he altered my thinking. Like a true father, he guided me into the world of Shakespearean heroines and taught me to how look at their words and really understand them. Over many years of living with the words of this greatest of humanists, I’ve come to the conclusion (like many, I’m sure) that his women are, on the whole, the teachers of men — they light the way through wit, sexuality, fortitude, common sense and gentleness to a better and more harmonious way of being together.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The current debate that is raging in the world about the status of women in relation to the continuing patriarchal control through religion, violence, political domination, sexual predation and blind inability to accept that all people should be given equal opportunities, is there in Shakespeare’s writing, loud and clear. As a species, we haven’t changed much in 400 years. That is why his plays are still alive and loved in every country in the world. And that is why this particular production of <i>Coriolanus</i> has been so successful in its transfer to present-day America. There are living examples of each of these characters who were alive in 491 BCE, written about by Shakespeare in 1610, and are now voicing their partisan political arguments on America’s streets and in every media outlet possible.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That being said, the last two productions of a Shakespeare play I have had the pleasure to act in were both <i>The Tempest</i> in which I played Prospero each time, as a man, or more specifically, as a male–entity. I loved the opportunity to explore the vast scope of that character from his monumental rage to a sublime realization of the equal power of forgiveness and compassion.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg64REj3-BkSKtjIMV3uIHQ1enN7EcH319NzRhr-j9AfZxgzLeTyTdq0VG01mLNn4MhFtnvuOc7zfiVmeKlmNlAqNnPk5pB5hWhuOUDQvhWPRcueBY1rf6M_FnIWSTyuO9RI83R2yJUnrA/s1600/Coriolanus+-+Red+Bull+-+photo+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg64REj3-BkSKtjIMV3uIHQ1enN7EcH319NzRhr-j9AfZxgzLeTyTdq0VG01mLNn4MhFtnvuOc7zfiVmeKlmNlAqNnPk5pB5hWhuOUDQvhWPRcueBY1rf6M_FnIWSTyuO9RI83R2yJUnrA/s320/Coriolanus+-+Red+Bull+-+photo+1.jpg" width="250" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Harrow with Dion Johnston as Coriolanus</span></td></tr>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">On an intersecting subject, Shakespeare wrote many ingénues, several adult roles, and some aging women. How does his perspective on a woman’s age affect his portrait of her?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think his perspective on the aging of women is no different than that of his aging men. It depends on the character as much as anything. Justice Shallow is not Queen Margaret in <i>Richard III</i>, yet they both speak from their particular life experience. And a character’s social position also determines what they say. I’m sure, if Juliet’s nurse were not the nurse and subservient to Juliet’s parents, she might have been more supportive of Juliet’s position in that appalling scene where Juliet is viciously berated by her father for refusing to marry Paris.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>What else do you think affected the way he wrote women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I don’t think he writes his women differently from his men. It’s just that there are a lot more male characters because if one is dealing with stories of power, kingdoms, battles, and history, society has given men a more prominent role in those stories. Or, the argument could be made that because only men were allowed to act in those days, it was easier to write mostly male roles.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Over the course of your career, how have you seen Shakespearean staging and acting change?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In 1969 I started out my theatrical career playing in the RSC’s main house in Stratford-upon-Avon which held 1,200 people, and now in 2016, I am playing Volumnia in the 199-seat Barrow Street Theatre in New York’s West Village. So there’s an immediate difference to the demands on an actor’s ability to communicate with every member of the audience, without the help of a mike.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What opportunities have young women gained in classical theater, and what’s been lost?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In 1969, it was very rare for women to play male roles as a matter of course, but in our present production all but one of the women (me) in Coriolanus portray men at some point in the play, most notably Merritt Jansen, who’s visibly pregnant, as the tribune Brutus Sicinius, yet she is still addressed as “Sir” and no one blinks. That’s quite a change. Yet, is it? Sarah Bernhardt was famous for her performance of Hamlet and <b><a href="https://youtu.be/aXh9IbESHA0" target="_blank">even made a film of it in 1900</a></b>, so women have been playing male roles in Shakespeare for a long time. Certainly, the number of young women pouring out of training programs as burningly ambitious actresses with no intention of being held back by convention, has led to a growing trend for Shakespearean productions with all-female casts, which is terrific.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to?</span></b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Harrow as Prospero<br />Pop-Up Globe in Auckland NZ, 2016</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I would loved to have played Cleopatra but was never asked. And at my age, there aren’t many opportunities to play the great heroines. I have often thought it would be interesting to do <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> and <i>Antony and Cleopatra</i> with the same actors playing both roles, as an exploration of Shakespeare’s views on youthful and middle-aged passion. But once again, who would contemplate such a project with someone my age? But I do enjoy working on their texts with young actors.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I wouldn’t mind having another crack at Prospero. He was a kick in the head to play. The internal impact of the emotional depths needed to perform his words in Act 5.1 from the point where he gives up his search for vengeance and opens his heart to the healing power of forgiveness is unlike any other force I have ever encountered in a career playing a huge variety of amazing roles.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://www.redbulltheater.com/" target="_blank">Red Bull Theater</a>'s <i>Coriolanus</i> runs from October 18 to November 20 in the West Village. <a href="https://web.ovationtix.com/trs/pr/963781" target="_blank">Tickets</a> start at $80.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>photos</b> Carol Rosegg</span></div>
Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-57863703158217414302016-10-31T11:00:00.000-04:002016-10-31T13:49:14.216-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Janni Goslinga on Margaret<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>I'm thrilled to email with <a href="http://tga.nl/en/employees/janni-goslinga" target="_blank">Janni Goslinga</a>, the leading lady in Ivo van Hove's production of <i>Kings of War</i>. The six-hour epic, playing at BAM this weekend, adapts <i>Henry V</i>, <i>Henry VI 1-3</i>, and <i>Richard III</i> into a single drama. </b></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; font-weight: bold;">Van Hove’s direction of classics, especially his recent Broadway mountings of Arthur Miller, has struck some as iconoclastic (as if that's a flaw). Goslinga has worked with van Hove many times, and now plays his Margaret, the original template for Shakespeare's 'powerful queen' roles.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Thanks for talking with me, Janni</b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>. What have you discovered about Margaret that you find fascinating?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Margaret is a survivor. She is ruthless to others and herself. She sees what is necessary and what must be done to rise to power and stay in power. Which is exactly what she wants. She is married off to the King of England as part of a deal negotiated between France and England, and leaves her whole world behind to become Queen. When she discovers that Henry is weak and unfit to be a king, she decides to assume control. Margaret is too strong-willed, has too much ambition and too much talent to play the dutiful little wife: ‘…is it okay for Henry to act like nothing more than a school boy? Am I a queen in nothing but title and really secondary to a Duke?’</span></div>
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<b>Which scenes are the most challenging?</b></div>
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The scene in which she loses control, when Henry gets a nervous breakdown, is definitely the most challenging to play. Henry hears of the death of his good friend Gloucester, begins to suspect Margaret’s lover Suffolk and starts praying obsessively. Margaret tries desperately to stay in control, but plotting to murder Gloucester has sent adrenaline rushing through her system. She struggles to suppress feelings of deep resentment and anger towards her weak husband. Finally she explodes: ‘I have done everything for you! Look at me! <i>Do</i> something!’ Margaret’s survival instinct tells her to fight, but Henry’s response in the face of danger is flight. This scene has to be rough, frantic, irrational. We act it out differently every night.</div>
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<b>What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></div>
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In the following scene for instance, […] when Suffolk is unmasked and banished for his crime, the lovers say a passionate farewell. We rehearsed that scene several times and tried to inject strong sexual tension into it. At a certain point Ivo [van Hove] proposed to cut out all the romantic ‘…I’m lost without you…’ phrases from Margaret. Suffolk gets an emotional outburst. Margaret only replies: ‘The King is coming. Go. Take my heart with you.’</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">Goslinga (l) with Eelco Smits as Henry VI</td></tr>
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When that mind switch became clear to me, I knew how to play this role. This is a woman who is able to see the future — and put her son’s interests first. What is left to save? She kicks her lover to the curb and refuses to feel the pain this causes her. She won’t allow it. All she gives herself is that one little sentence that she barks at him on his way out: ‘and take my heart with you.’</div>
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She is a survivor.</div>
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<b>Margaret was the first of Shakespeare’s powerful queen roles, and, across three plays, it’s the largest part in his complete works. How does <i>Kings of War</i> present her, as compared with the strong men and weak kings?</b></div>
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<i>Richard III</i> is the only play regularly performed in the Netherlands. Dutch audiences generally view Margaret as ‘that crazy woman who swears like a sailor’. They are never quite sure what her reasons for swearing are and who she is really cursing. Performing <i>Henry VI</i> and <i>Richard III</i> allows us to show her forcefulness. When she is crowned Queen of England, she has high expectations. She is bitterly disappointed when it becomes clear that her husband has no actual power and that the court nobility is really in charge. Margaret becomes a true Iron Lady: ‘Lords, hard politics freeze up my Henry.’</div>
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Margaret is dominant, unwilling to compromise in negotiations and will stop at nothing to achieve her goals. She is hard on herself and has great contempt for men who show weakness. Attack is her best line of defense. She calls Henry ‘a walking disaster’ and tells Suffolk he’s a ‘sorry excuse for a man, a spineless crybaby.’ The only person she has a soft spot for is her son. When Henry offers York the rights to the throne and betrays their son, she leaves him, raises an army with her son and goes to battle. When, much later, she returns to curse Richard III — the man responsible for killing her husband and son — she is totally fearless. She is like a terrorist with nothing left to lose. She has returned for one reason only: to wreak havoc and bring about destruction. Destruction through precision bombing in words. Ivo rightly calls her ‘a ticking time bomb’ in this scene.</div>
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<b>How does van Hove's creative aesthetic fit with the Shakespeare you’ve done together?</b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Goslinga (l.) in <i>Roman Tragedies</i></td></tr>
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With <i>Roman Tragedies</i> the concept was a big political conference, one that we were all part of, both the audience and the actors. The news ticker and the television screens all flashed the same announcement: in ten minutes you will witness the murder of Julius Caesar. We moved through the audience. This gave the whole performance an intensity and a level of tension I had never seen before. The audience literally sits next to us as we fight, make love, invent conspiracies and die.</div>
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In <i>Kings of War</i>, with its War Rooms and secret passages, we also play to the camera and the audience at the same time. It’s an acting style that we have developed together and I personally love it.</div>
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In <i>Othello</i>, created by Jan [Versweyveld, set & light designer] over a decade ago, a glass house that served as a warship and a bedroom at the same time moved slowly towards the front of the stage. The play started out as theater and ended in a close-up like in a Hitchcock movie, next to Othello and Desdemona’s bed. Audience members later told us that they wanted to run up on stage and stop Othello when he gets ready to kill her.</div>
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I have also starred in a <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> production in which Julia’s whole family was made up of tango dancers. This resulted in a few very unique scenes, but I did not feel that the concept was able to carry the whole play.</div>
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<b>Can you tell me more about van Hove's and Jan Versweyveld's aesthetic vision, and how it shapes your performance?</b></div>
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Ivo and Jan always have a fresh and compelling view of the pieces they want to do. Their approach is indeed ‘un-holy’, or maybe I should say nothing is holy in the process of rehearsals, as long as it is in line with the concept. The concept is always very well thought-out. The space that Jan has developed and the situations Ivo describes to us actors, always offer a lot of inspiration that we can use in our portrayal of the scenes. Most of the time, things fall into place naturally from that concept and the choices Ivo makes are a natural, organic result.</div>
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Ivo and Jan’s immeasurable talents lie in the creation of concepts that really capture the essence of a piece and they’re never dogmatic. It’s fun for them to watch what happens with their ideas on stage.</div>
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<b>In your career you’ve worked on several of Shakespeare's plays. What’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">Goslinga (l.) as Emilia in <i>Othello</i> (2012)</td></tr>
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For me, it’s mostly a shame that they usually don’t have as many lines as the male characters do. Or the fact that they are given fewer opportunities to be philosophical, contemplate matters, express doubts or offer arguments. Because, really, I think it’s exquisite when they do. I had the honor of playing Emilia in <i>Othello</i> and her monologue is second to none, not even Shylock’s: ‘Let men know that women have senses too: we can see and smell and we have a palate that knows sweet and sour just like a man’s does…’ Her development in this play is amazing; from an insecure woman trapped in an abusive marriage with husband Iago who despises her and constantly spews racist and sexist remarks (even Donald Trump pales in comparison), to a confident human being who, as the stars align against her, finally sees clearly for the first time when it’s too late and raises her voice to the heavens in agony.</div>
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<b>How does his perspective on a woman’s age affect his portrait of her?</b></div>
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How he does that is his gift, I suppose. I played Julia back when I was a theater student in college and now I’m playing Margaret — who’s absolutely ancient by the time she returns in <i>Richard III</i>. The rhythm of a character’s language, the way their minds work, their choice of words, but also the way they view the world — you get to use all of this to show a character’s age. It gives you the hormones and crazy, overwhelming infatuation of teenager Julia, and the centuries of wrath and war and the hate-filled nature of Margaret. A dinosaur who survives everything.</div>
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<b>What about your dual roles in <i>Roman Tragedies</i>, with its take on modern politics?</b></div>
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In <i>Roman Tragedies</i> I play ‘the wife’ — the woman behind the successful man. I play both Coriolanus’s silent lady and Julius Caesar’s better half Calpurnia, who foresees his fate but is powerless to stop it from coming to pass as he refuses to listen to her and leaves for the Senate anyway.</div>
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I recently read somewhere that, in a lot of descriptions of Hillary Clinton, she is first referred to as Bill Clinton’s wife. Clearly ‘wife of’ is still a position that people would like to see women in today. The fact that these characters play subordinate roles does not mean that you have to portray them as submissive types. In our show, by putting me on stage repeatedly, Ivo shows how the silent woman cries angry tears on the couch at home when she sees Coriolanus getting himself banished by being stubborn. When she later goes to beg him to do something, she shows a stubbornness equal to that of her husband.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">Goslinga (l.) as Virgilia<br />in <i>Roman Tragedies</i> (2012)</td></tr>
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These are important choices to make, to allow these characters their fair share of stage time. To take every character seriously, always, without any moral judgment.</div>
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<b>Is there anything in Shakespeare's plays that’s beyond salvaging?</b></div>
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I wouldn’t say there’s anything beyond salvaging. But in order to successfully portray the change in Lady Anne’s character in <i>Richard III</i>, or to deliver a strong closing monologue as Katherine in the <i>Taming of the Shrew</i>, you need an exciting and fitting angle. Exciting for both men and women of the 21st century.</div>
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<b>Do you have any other Shakespearean roles you’d love to play, or to go back to? Not just the women either—any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I would love to play Lady Macbeth. Recently at Toneelgroep Amsterdam, male dream-roles also have been played by women by the way: Octavius Caesar is played by a woman in our </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Roman Tragedies</i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">. And we have performed </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Queen Lear</i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> and </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Hamlet vs Hamlet</i><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">, both with a female title role.</span></div>
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<b>Toneelgroup Amsterdam and BAM's <i><a href="http://www.bam.org/theater/2016/kings-of-war" target="_blank">Kings of War</a></i> runs from November 3 to 6 at BAM Howard Gilman Opera House. <a href="http://commerce.bam.org/tickets/production.aspx?pid=11652" target="_blank">Tickets</a> start at $30.</b></div>
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<b>photos</b> Jan Versweyveld</div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-65295460528219233582016-10-17T11:00:00.000-04:002016-10-17T11:00:16.501-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Mairin Lee on She Stoops to Conquer<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">This autumn, the Actor's Company Theatre (TACT) revives <i>She Stoops to Conquer</i>. Written in 1771, Oliver Goldsmith's comedy has Kate Hardcastle impersonate a servant to learn the true personality of her beloved. <a href="http://www.mairinlee.com/" target="_blank">Mairin Lee</a>, an actor whose classical resume includes ACT and the McCarter, takes the title role in TACT's staging. I emailed with Ms. Lee about Kate, the play, and its relationship to Shakespeare.</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7kWzdd2x6J6bNWUAdYIPV67odBZcUWIdeNQetlc6ohFjFhvk8N0vi85s33_4d-yFo6oXo1ApW7RLJO-S2xA2gTKdRhvbsRJLRLg7ONoQl1S102S8nY76eNV750uW2x_c8oG942kN4WnA/s1600/She+Stoops+%25E2%2580%2593+headshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7kWzdd2x6J6bNWUAdYIPV67odBZcUWIdeNQetlc6ohFjFhvk8N0vi85s33_4d-yFo6oXo1ApW7RLJO-S2xA2gTKdRhvbsRJLRLg7ONoQl1S102S8nY76eNV750uW2x_c8oG942kN4WnA/s320/She+Stoops+%25E2%2580%2593+headshot.jpg" width="213" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Goldsmith and <i>She Stoops to Conquer</i>. What do you love in this play?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I love this play because it’s tremendously fun. The characters do outrageous things to get what they want, but their deepest hopes are real and recognizable. Kate dreams of true love. She commits whole-heartedly to that journey and takes incredible risks along the way. Each character has funny whims and eccentricities, and they’re all genuinely fighting for something.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Why it’s worth reviving in 2016?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Aside from the fact that it’s super funny, it’s stayed relevant. Goldsmith wrote it hundreds of years ago, but it feels very modern. There’s something recognizable in the familial dynamics of the Hardcastles; the troubles of wooing a mate; dissembling to further your cause. These are eternal questions: how do I find love? how do I balance loyalty to my family but also exercise my own freedom? how do I overcome obstacles?</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What have you discovered about Kate Hardcastle?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Kate is wonderfully plucky, brave, funny, and sweet. She’s intuitive and smart and she cares deeply for her family. Even when she expresses uncertainty, Scott has encouraged me to find a positive spin. I love that approach because it shows how game she is; how much delight she finds in challenges. I think Kate’s an avid reader; she absolutely devours romance novels. And she is the heroine in her own story. Every obstacle is an opportunity for something extraordinary to happen.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What are the challenges in bringing her to life?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The biggest challenge has been finding Kate in our particular style. There are many ways this play can be presented. It could support very broad comedy, but we wanted to keep the characters as real as possible. And yet Kate makes some wild decisions. So I’ve been discovering how to balance that; how to stay grounded and real while also committing to the play’s crazy twists and turns.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What does her choice of disguises say about her and her assumptions about servants?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We have to remember that it’s not exactly her idea. Mr. Marlow gets so nervous around upper-class women that he can barely speak. He's more forward with women of a lower class. The first time they meet, he can't even look her in the face! Then, when she changes from her finery into a plainer dress, he doesn't recognize her and asks if she's a barmaid. She takes the idea and runs with it, because it’s the only way she’s going to get to know him better.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So it’s more about Marlow’s assumptions of lower class women. Kate is essentially herself, just in a different dress and using a different dialect. This perhaps gives her permission to flirt with him a little more than she normally would, but she doesn’t act wholly out of character. I actually think she’s quite egalitarian and feminist.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What links have you found between Kate Hardcastle and Shakespeare’s romantic heroines?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There are lots of parallels to be drawn here! Kate has some power at the top of the play — her father says, “I will never control your choice” — but she creates even more agency for herself. Her father facilitates the introduction with Marlow, but she takes the courtship into her own hands. Many of Shakespeare’s heroines have — or devise — agency in their lives and romantic endeavors. We see characters like Juliet and Desdemona explicitly go against their fathers' wishes. In the tragedies, of course, that doesn’t always work out well. But we do get happy endings for others, like Rosalind and Viola.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Lee (r) with John Rothman</span></td></tr>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">As a woman in 1773, what could Kate do or say that they couldn’t?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">1773 was during the birth of the modern marriage. Love was becoming a deciding factor. If Kate didn’t like Marlow, it would have been within her power to turn him down. This reflects a greater cultural shift in the idea of marriage, and is different from some of the ultimatums laid down in Shakespeare’s plays.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Looking more broadly the play, how does Goldsmith portray women in <i>She Stoops</i>, especially with regard to class?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is interesting, because our production has cut the female servants. We’re doing the play with eight actors, and Scott figured out how to retain the plot without most of the smaller roles. So we only have Kate, Constance, and Mrs. Hardcastle, who are upper class, and Kate’s barmaid character, who is lower class. As I mentioned, Kate becomes the barmaid so that Marlow can act more freely. As the barmaid, she’s not as proper as she usually is, but she doesn’t do anything completely out of character. The differences are that she uses another dialect (“the true bar cant”) and, in our production, a more free physicality.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I think the question we’re getting at here is — why does Marlow act one way around upper-class women and another around lower-class women? What is Goldsmith saying about the fact that Marlow treats Kate differently depending on what she’s wearing and how she’s speaking? I have a sense that he's poking fun at Marlow, and perhaps using him to draw attention to the folly of the class system itself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The answer will also differ depending on how Marlow’s played. Jeremy Beck is not only one of funniest actors I’ve worked with, but he also gives Marlow moments of such vulnerability and tenderness. I think the audience can really see why Kate falls in love with him.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Looking at <a href="http://www.mairinlee.com/" target="_blank">your website</a>, you’ve got plenty of experience in classical drama. How do you grapple with the ingrained sexism of those pre-modern plays?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Aha. While it’s no doubt important to look at the greater themes of these plays, my way in is always through the character. My first obligation is to her and to see the world through her eyes. I have some friends who ask, "Why do you want to do Shakespeare? Your characters usually end up in a puddle of tears! The world is so stacked against them!" And to that I say, YES. Look at all the obstacles in her path. Now: how does she handle them? What can we learn from her? How does Ophelia feel about being told what to do by her brother, her father, her king, and her boyfriend? How does each scene push Lady Macbeth closer and closer to madness?</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Lee as Ophelia<br />in PA Shakespeare Company's <i>Hamlet</i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That’s what’s fun for an actor. To figure out how a particular character overcomes — or doesn’t — what’s laid before her. So in the moment, the question doesn’t feel like how do I, Mairin, deal with the ingrained sexism of a play written three hundred years ago. Playwrights weren’t necessarily imagining a world where everything was fair and equal. They were showing it as it was, and it was often cruel and messy and unfair. There is sexism in the world of these plays because it was a more sexist world back then. That doesn't justify it or make it okay. I believe the best playwrights were able to subvert some of that sexism by endowing their women with enough creativity or bravery to battle it. First and foremost, they see their characters as human. And that's how I want to see them too.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Do you have any particular Shakespearean roles you’d love to perform?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Juliet has always been at the top of the list. </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">R&J</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> was the first the first play I ever saw, and it blew my world open. Her language is just heavenly. I think she’s one of Shakespeare’s smartest characters. Her heart is so big, and her imagination is astonishing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I’d love to do Rosaline in </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Love’s Labour’s Lost</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> and Olivia in </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Twelfth Night</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. Or any of the women in </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Antony and Cleopatra</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> — I played Iras and Octavia in a production at the McCarter a few years ago, and I fell in love with it. Just thinking about all these plays makes me happy and excited!</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Any dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I got to play Mercutio this summer in an Off-Broadway production with the Wheelhouse Theatre, and I loved it. I’d play him again in a heartbeat. He’s amazing. There’s a thousand different ways to go. He’s so many things in one — a braggart, a fighter, a clown, a poet. He could be super-masculine or totally androgynous. At times there’s something almost otherworldly about him. I was heartbroken when we closed; I wanted to keep exploring and playing and finding new things. I’ve thought at various times about other male characters — maybe Hal, maybe Orsino, maybe Horatio — but Mercutio really stole my heart.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><b>TACT's <a href="http://tactnyc.org/" target="_blank">She Stoops to Conquer</a> runs from October 4 to November 5 at Theatre Row. Tickets are $65.</b></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b><br /><b>photo #2 </b> Marielle Solan</span><br />
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-22004381877085221612016-09-15T13:00:00.000-04:002016-09-15T15:50:19.410-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Patricia McGregor on directing Hamlet<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<span style="clear: left; float: left; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkWTBZc4UAwLE-E4OCn_rqcxb7NB8m1a0PfaYN1uZRvqcpbd_muEVhpPTeQIB7zoP1CcRdgBJe-iReEn9HtWzcJIguD4qXQ32kwHPXwHL0MMMluu0wJgSUgA1f4lwe6fVpjCfZYHkhE8I/s320/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593+Public+%25E2%2580%2593+director+headshot.jpg" /></span><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Twice every season, the Public Theater's </span><a href="http://www.publictheater.org/en/Programs--Events/Mobile-Unit/" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Mobile Unit</a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> tours NYC neighborhoods with stagings of classic plays. The company is about to conclude its all-boro tour of Hamlet with a brief run at its home on Lafayette Street. Half of the sixteen artists credited are women, including three actors, the fight choreographer, and the director, </span><a href="http://patriciamcgregor.com/" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Patricia McGregor</a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">. Earlier this week, </span><a href="http://the-fifth-wall.blogspot.com/2016/09/women-on-shakespeare-kristolyn-lloyd-on.html" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I emailed with the show's Ophelia</a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">, and now I'm thrilled to listen to Ms. McGregor.</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Let’s put gender aside for a moment, and just talk <i>Hamlet</i>. What have you found most fascinating about the play?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What I found most fascinating was tracking how the revelation of injustice, in this case the murder of Hamlet's father, is the inciting incident that transforms a grieving young man who would rather shun public life into a man who sees the corrupt cracks in a whole system and is hell-bent on revenge. I find the soliloquies where Hamlet lets the audience into a very intimate debate on what to do next and reveals his rage, vulnerability, and confusion to be very moving and timely. This is especially true in many of the places the Mobile tour travels where folks in the audience are often wrestling with how to seek justice in an unjust world.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>What knots did the playwright leave for you and your company to untangle?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Shakespeare left us to untangle the steps in [Hamlet's] transformation and the moments when he, intentionally or not, inflicts his own violence in the name of avenging a murder. There is also a style and technical challenge to untangle which is how to honor both the comedy and the tragedy in the play. We wanted to have the extremes of both be truthfully alive in the production. I was interested in how this production could be an examination, a warning and a call to action. How could we marry what is fundamental to the play with what seems urgent in our times so that the production can sit on a nerve.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnBRSPtKpKQ8l2WL17oQM0V0i4QaUox5Bd_LCaIe9rNzx0kGbqkRmLD2p3-oQmmt3QMLoXiVfRa9Ihl7E-xDe_O0Lw2si5SYlpKaUDbWACf8B3KbFmMvGtgunmqmkuUBaGUxTNN62Q2iU/s1600/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593+Public+%25E2%2580%2593+photo+3.jpg"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Did you have preconceptions about <i>Hamlet</i> that got overturned in the rehearsal process?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Oskar Eustis recently came to a performance and told the actors that this production felt like a thriller. The rehearsal process overturned a preconception of just how fast and forward-footed we could make this piece while still honoring the moments of Hamlet's indecision and hesitation. The process revealed what a man of complex contradictions Hamlet is, eloquent and flawed, wise and damaged, enraged and in pain. An actor of Chukwudi Iwuji's excellence allowed us to mine the range and contemporary resonance of the journey. He was a gift. Each of the actors in the company made the work their own and made it sing in a fresh way.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>What about the women you worked with?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">[…] I loved working with Kristolyn Lloyd and Orlagh Cassidy on Ophelia and Gertrude. These roles can sometimes come off as thin or inauthentic. With Kristolyn we were able to create an Ophelia who has real spark, intelligence and soulfulness who also wrestles with the undertow of mental illness. She is caught as a woman wanting to express her individualism and personal power in a world where patriarchy still rules. By having her sing at the top of the show during our funeral prologue, we not only get to see a range of her emotions, but also the real connection between her and Hamlet before things go wrong. We get to see in her personal character and in their relationship a more modern and dimensional woman than I feel I often see with Ophelia.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>And Orlagh Cassidy's Gertrude?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">With Orlagh, we were able to mine the dangerous territory of a woman who allows the desire for comforts to turn a blind eye to things that her gut tells her are amiss. As a mother of a young son, it was important to me that there felt like a true love between Gertrude and Hamlet, but that we examine a woman who has chosen the privilege of blindness over truth seeking in a moment of crisis.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl3Tgr9UsfKYisdcRUx4F0boSdIZl89B1qATdo2rLeEkHjUzvOc0p_squzvUcKSV8Ihte4KfRBDC4oLcz3MPA-GgZAeOI8hNNVRxDQkBH6RICDozjL8Rte6ayx_865wWeSeAiKZSZnxEQ/s320/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0Public+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0photo+2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Kristolyn Lloyd & Jeffrey Omura</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">in Hamlet</span></div>
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<b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl3Tgr9UsfKYisdcRUx4F0boSdIZl89B1qATdo2rLeEkHjUzvOc0p_squzvUcKSV8Ihte4KfRBDC4oLcz3MPA-GgZAeOI8hNNVRxDQkBH6RICDozjL8Rte6ayx_865wWeSeAiKZSZnxEQ/s1600/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0Public+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0photo+2.jpg"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span></a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Kristolyn told me about the challenges of Ophelia's mad scenes. How did you and she approach those mad scenes in rehearsal?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Working with our wonderful composer Imani Uzuri on Ophelia's vocal expression of grief and madness was key to unlocking something that felt very harrowing and real. The "mad scenes" often feel played at, but in rehearsal we created a wail that hits you in the gut. Creating her vocal compositions were important for her character revelation and for switching the tone of the piece. Her guttural singing and fall into madness remind us of the collateral damage stemming from the domino effect of the initial murder.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>The smaller cast gives this <i>Hamlet</i> more gender parity than most. How do your role as the director affect the production’s depictions of women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">It was important to me that we pushed for more than just two women in the production. Casting the excellent Natalie Woolams-Torres allowed us to see other representations of women in the world. We get to witness Natalie inhabit the positions of strong secret service protector, charismatic childhood buddy, efficient messenger, and more. We could have easily cast that track as a male, but I'm so glad we did not. We actually auditioned women in three roles in addition to Ophelia and Gertrude. I am always looking for places where women and people of color not traditionally cast can make sense in my productions.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>That's one more good reason to hire women to direct Shakespeare. I don't find many directors to interview for this series.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I'd note as you are focusing on women and Shakespeare that I have had so many examples of women directing Shakespeare that oddly men directing it used to seem strange to me. My first middle school theater teacher, as well as my high school program director, as well as the head of the department, dean and chair of my undergrad program, as well as the head of my grad program were all women. I had seen them all tango with the Bard. Early in my career I worked with Deborah Warner on <i>Medea</i> and got to watch her process and speak to her about directing Shakespeare. Also my mom is British and grew up making sets for these plays in school, so she is well-versed on the canon. I bring this up to say that for me there have not been the same barriers of not having seen women approach the work as some people have endured. There are women in my life who set a great example of standing toe to toe with the work and making it your own. I hope to be a women who can be this kind of example to those who come after me.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcf8Qu4x7zmiBjMdldoHVaOMnUHnsG5GLMNiIvCVE5Xrl9thl4yrL7DQewPdsz3oGf7_Ox8Jdi8_FdTb5nqNJWzPoZv6unpeDVN7jFgxy1xPCaZlgn4hl2N4UyvWx2Ksz50TtjuMHq47c/s1600/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593+Mobile+Unit+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0photo+4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcf8Qu4x7zmiBjMdldoHVaOMnUHnsG5GLMNiIvCVE5Xrl9thl4yrL7DQewPdsz3oGf7_Ox8Jdi8_FdTb5nqNJWzPoZv6unpeDVN7jFgxy1xPCaZlgn4hl2N4UyvWx2Ksz50TtjuMHq47c/s320/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593+Mobile+Unit+%25E2%2580%2593%25C2%25A0photo+4.jpg" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; font-size: x-small; text-align: justify;">Chukwudi Iwuji as Hamlet</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>How does your identity as an African-American woman inform your vision?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">In a time where violence targeting color and women are all-too-regular front-page topics, a play that looks at the murder of a king and the subsequence ripple effect leading to the collapse of a whole court sits on a nerve for me. It feels like it sits on a nerve for this country. The task of cutting the play down to Mobile Unit parameters seemed worthwhile for all the resonance I felt the play has with the crisis we are facing today.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Have the Mobile Unit’s audiences been enjoying the production?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I've only had the chance to see two Mobile Unit stops as I flew out to begin rehearsal for a play at the Guthrie just after the tour began. The audiences I witnessed were extremely engaged in both performances I was able to attend. I cannot wait to come back and see how the work has deepened.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>How did you cut and revise the play to fit the Mobile Unit’s constraints?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The cut was done with the massive help from Jim Shapiro. I spoke with him and let him know what I wanted to focus on and what I wanted to let go of. I was also in conversations with Chuk early on about Hamlet’s journey, so we talked to Jim about suggestions. Then during rehearsal we made several additional cuts and one key restore of text. Jim and the whole cast were great collaborators on all these cuts and shifts and we all had the same goal of the most engaging, moving, and provocative show possible in under two hours.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Shakespeare wrote some brilliant and inspiring women and also wrote some very problematic roles for and language about women. You can feel the male gaze at play in many of his pieces. Then again you have amazing representations of women like Paulina and Hermione in <i>Winter's Tale</i>. Paulina is fearless and braver than any of the men in the play, in speaking truth to power and standing up to injustice. Hermione is extraordinary in her grace and capacity for forgiveness. I feel these two women together represent an amazing aria of spectrum of womanhood. We can be strong as an ox, and as healing as any medicine in the world. I think Shakespeare's strength in depicting women is when he gives them language to speak their minds and they do it with intelligence, fire, and poetry.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>What about his weaknesses?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">His weakness is when he uses them as objects or objectives them. The thing I would have to really think about is any of the pieces that call for rape or major physical violence against women. I think there are ways in which those acts can be strangely glorified onstage. This troubles me. I'd have to do some hard thinking if I were to approach a Shakespeare play involving these pieces.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQq4oHua6TRPCwJmUuuqPPUpxm7_Wfl2EpBmdgEvquR94Wg8WvcMUkB73420ogluDfP9W5MkR_Mkhd1aIF3euFuMagijC__CpMG2dcsnWVVZfo658AvZC8Zb_UbtAkjFotJSXnhBsPrOg/s1600/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593+Mobile+Unit+%25E2%2580%2593+photo+4.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQq4oHua6TRPCwJmUuuqPPUpxm7_Wfl2EpBmdgEvquR94Wg8WvcMUkB73420ogluDfP9W5MkR_Mkhd1aIF3euFuMagijC__CpMG2dcsnWVVZfo658AvZC8Zb_UbtAkjFotJSXnhBsPrOg/s320/Hamlet+%25E2%2580%2593+Mobile+Unit+%25E2%2580%2593+photo+4.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">McGregor's production of <i>The Winter's Tale</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">at California Shakespeare Theater</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>I read online that you directed <i>The Winter's Tale</i>. Have you done any other Shakespearean plays?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I'm directing <i>Measure for Measure</i> at the Old Globe this fall. I've directed <i>Romeo and Juliet</i> and acted in several other Shakespeare plays. I got into theater in 8th grade when I got asthma and happened to take a theater class where we read <i>Midsummer's Night Dream</i>. I loved it from the very beginning. It just made sense to me and I love the athleticism of the language and the wild range of characters in each piece.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>Any dream-productions brewing in your head? What would be your first choice of his plays to direct?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I'd love another chance to look at <i>Winter's Tale</i>. I've also got a <i>Tempest</i>, <i>Antony and Cleopatra</i>, <i>Macbeth</i>, <i>Twelfth Night</i> and <i>Midsummer's</i> rolling around. <i>Lear</i> used to scare me as a play. I thought, what do I really understand about this journey? Then my elderly father came to live with me and I began to understand something about Lear. Shakespeare is so rich because it will grow and change with you as you grow and change. In that way, the text is always new and alive.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The Public's Mobile Unit stages </span><a href="http://www.publictheater.org/en/Public-Theater-Season/Mobile-Unit-Hamlet/" style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Hamlet</a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"> from Sept 19 to Oct 9 at the Public Theater in the Village. Tickets are $20.</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b> Erik Pearson</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>photos #2 & 3</b> Joan Marcus</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>photo #4</b> mellopix.com</span></div>
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Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-45230773609151212022016-09-12T13:00:00.000-04:002016-09-13T10:21:31.591-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Kristolyn Lloyd on Ophelia<br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy and even male-only, coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is the second season of my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shakespeare and related work in New York City.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Twice every season, the Public Theater's <a href="http://www.publictheater.org/en/Programs--Events/Mobile-Unit/" target="_blank">Mobile Unit</a> tours NYC neighborhoods with stagings of classic plays. The company is about to conclude its all-boro tour of <i>Hamlet</i> with a brief run at its home on Lafayette St. Kristolyn Lloyd plays the fair Ophelia, under the direction of Patricia MacGregor. I hope to email Ms. MacG later this week, but it's a pleasure to speak first with Ms. Lloyd, soon to make her Broadway debut in <i><a href="http://dearevanhansen.com/" target="_blank">Dear Evan Hansen</a></i>.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Let’s start with Ophelia. What's the biggest challenge of the role? What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Ophelia was a challenge from the first scene to the last. Her inner life feels so much more mysterious compared to Hamlet because she reveals so much less than he does. Her turmoil appears to occur after Hamlet tells her to go to a nunnery, breaking her heart. I had to approach that loss for her as a complete shock. Him rejecting her was not how she had hoped the scene would end. We don't know much of her past and therefore the audience has got to connect with her from the moment she's on stage. I think Patricia did a lovely job creating a specific world for the audience. From the moment the show starts, we get a sense of who this woman is to this world and who she is to Hamlet.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>How do you envision her inner life over the arc of the play?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I saw her journey through the show initially through a play list of songs. Music has always been an important investigating tool for me when approaching a character. She seemed like a young woman with a very deep soul. So I started with artists like Fatai, India Arie, and Ledisi. She's deeply in love at the top of the show and these artists sing about that kind of love. As the plot thickens, I imagine that all she's aware of is her own pain, and would be confused by everyone's recent behavior. In the world we've created no one is filling this young woman in on any secret plots or plans. I was also inspired by hip and pop artist like Drake, Beyoncé, Ariana Grande, Florence & The Machine, and Sia. Her fall has to be enormous and heartbreaking. Music is about emotional extremes and there's always a song that can capture them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>How do you approach her mad scenes, and play them honestly? What links them to the sane woman earlier in the play?</b></span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Lloyd (r)<br />with Jeffrey Omura as Polonius</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I found that her mad scenes are born out of isolation. The depth of sorrow over the loss of intimacy with the ones you love and counted on is universal. How is she motherless? When did that happen? I imagine she's got quite a depth and strength to her after losing a mother. Her brother leaves, her best friend and love of her life ignores her, verbally abuses her, and rejects her. She's the most alone she's ever felt and then her father is murdered. She doesn't even get to say goodbye. She's now lost all her life-lines. What would a person, who is trying to make sense of why this happened to her, be like by the time she takes her own life? I, sometimes reluctantly, have to put on that story every show and try to do right by her. It's her story.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>This <i>Hamlet</i> has more gender parity than most, especially behind the scenes. How does that play into the production’s depictions of women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Having such a heavy female presence brings in so much humanity. It's a three- to four-hour play, that's been cut down (quite well thanks to Patricia and Jim Shapiro) to an hour 40, and with a short process. We were very fortunate to have women who can multi-task, who care about the details, and manage the time so well. Patricia McGregor assembled a great group of artists! Our composer, Imani Uzuri, found music for the show that brings a beautiful thread of texture to the tone and atmosphere. We had a female movement coordinator, fight choreographer, vocal assistant, and stage management team. So when Patricia and I first talked about Ophelia we both agreed there was no room for a frail wilting flower. We have to root for her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>How have the local audiences been enjoying the Mobile Unit’s production?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I wanted audiences on the Mobile tour to simply connect with the story. I was so surprised and elated when we went to a women's shelter and they were so vocal. They knew lines, they showed their support for certain characters and disdain for others. They weren't shy and I have to admit it was a bit of a rush! Knowing that they are with you on your journey was comforting. They are generally for Ophelia, not against her, and they always seem so devastated when she loses it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Talking about Shakespeare more generally, what’s your perspective on his roles for women?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I feel a bit limited when it comes to speaking on whether or not William Shakespeare writes well for women. I don't presume to know anything that hasn't already been said. I think he writes well for the central characters. Always. Which in some case are women. When I think of <i>Measure for Measure</i> or <i>Romeo and Juliet</i>, I feel as though he has the highest regard for women who fight for their integrity. But you can't deny the absence of character context with other women in his plays like Desdemona or even Ophelia. I would dare to say there was just as much a double standard in Elizabethan days as is there is in today's writing. Women have always fought to be seen with more dimensions than society has given them permission be; in theatre, film, and television.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Directors tend to cast white men in Shakespeare, partly out of habit. What perspectives and insights do you bring to his plays, as an African-American and a woman?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">As actors we are responsible for pushing ourselves to take more risk in our craft and also in life. So much of what makes a performance memorable is what the person playing role brings to it. Whether it's a more humorous outlook on it all, or one of struggle. Both bring color to the tapestry of life they bring out in a character. I found that my experience as a black woman was a Godsend when playing Ophelia. How does a black woman who is young and doing the best she can with what she's been given respond to the turmoil we see her go through? The performer's perspective of these present circumstances is what the character is filtered through and that's what the audience is looking forward to being immersed in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>What other Shakespearean roles have you done?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So far I have played Juliet, Ophelia, and Hamlet. Yes, Hamlet.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I would love to do Juliet again or perhaps a comedy! I wouldn't be upset if I was cast as Helena in <i>Midsummer</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>I'll look forward to your Ophelia. Break a leg, and thanks for speaking with me!</b><br /><b><br /></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>The Public's Mobile Unit stages <i><a href="http://www.publictheater.org/en/Public-Theater-Season/Mobile-Unit-Hamlet/" target="_blank">Hamlet</a></i> from Sept 19 to Oct 9 at the Public Theater in the Village. Tickets are $20.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b> Cathryn Farnsworth<br /><b>photos #2 & 3</b> Joan Marcus</span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3195102361160836342.post-114100724443944652016-07-25T11:00:00.000-04:002016-07-27T10:29:49.388-04:00Women on Shakespeare: Ismenia Mendes on Cressida<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Since most Shakespearean casts are male-heavy (and some are male-only), coverage tends to focus on men who create the work. Let's balance that out! This is #13 in my interview series, Women on Shakespeare. I'm talking with the women who produce and perform Shak and related work in New York.</b><br />
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<b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">This summer, Ismenia Mendes stars in <i>Troilus and Cressida</i> at the Public Theater's free Shakespeare in the Park. Our conversation about <i>Much Ado</i>'s Hero (who she played at the same venue in Summer '14) inspired me to start this series, so </b><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I'm particularly thrilled to email with her about her return visit to the Delacorte, and how her perspective on Shakespeare's women has changed in two years.</b><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It's a pleasure to talk with you again, Ismenia! Let’s start with your role as Cressida. She’s not as well-known as most of Shakespeare’s heroines. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What have you discovered about her that you find fascinating? What are her finest qualities, and her worst ones? What knots did the playwright leave for you to untangle?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I actually had not read this play until auditioning for it. Maybe it was that I read it at 2 a.m. but my first thought after reading it was, “Holy shit, this woman belongs to the 21st century.” She is so unbelievably contemporary. She’s crude, smart, sexy, cynical (or tries to be) — and her story is one of Shakespeare’s most relevant to today’s culture of misogyny. This is also a play where Shakespeare poses a lot of problems/questions and doesn’t really give you many answers. You’re pretty much on your own — luckily this play in particular just </span><i style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">begs</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> interpretation. I’m actually grateful that Cressida is played so seldom. It’s really given me the opportunity to define her for myself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Cressida shows a very different spirit than most of Shak’s lovers, maybe one more open to interpretation. How would you describe her relationships with her uncle, Troilus, and Diomedes? How do you envision her inner life over the arc of the play?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here’s the thing. Cressida’s dad defected to the Greek side (She’s a Trojan) years ago and she has basically been raised by her very dirty, very outspoken, and very bawdy uncle. As a result, you have a woman who is equally bawdy, equally outspoken and easily the smartest person in every scene. She has no real social standing, which gives her a lot more freedom than most of Shakespeare’s other heroines — and she uses that freedom. She is acutely self-aware, but also struggling to define herself in this very masculine world. I feel like her uncle has raised her with all of these warnings about men, and so she tries to project this cynical, hardened façade, but is actually this very innocent, intelligent young woman struggling to find her place in the world, and in love.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mendes as Cressida with John Glover (c)<br />
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<b>In Shakespeare’s era, “as false as Cressida” was a sexist cliché about women’s infidelity. How does her role in the story address that cliché? Is there room for its ironic subversion in modern times?</b></div>
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I actually believe that what Shakespeare has written is very much in defense of Cressida. And I honestly have some real difficulties understanding how the few productions that have been done of Troilus and Cressida have been so damning of her. The timing of this production is so perfect, what with the Brock Turner case and the conversation this country is having about our rape culture. Cressida is forced into an impossible decision — she does what she does to <i>survive</i>. She is in no way, the ‘inconstant woman.’</div>
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<b>Can you tell us about the other women in <i>T&C</i>’s cast? You, Nneka Okafor, and Tala Ashe are a racially and culturally diverse trio, and (unlike Taming earlier this summer) the three of you are a minority gender-wise too. Do you think those identities play into the production’s depictions of women?</b></div>
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Absolutely. The women in this play all have one thing in common: they are consistently devalued and silenced. I think Dan purposefully cast only men in the ensemble. The women are so vastly outnumbered that there is this sense that they may, at any time, be swallowed whole. And I think, metaphorically, they are.</div>
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<b>You’re working closely with John Glover again! How would you describe your chemistry together? What have you picked up from him here and in <i>Much Ado</i>? And how do Cressida and Pandarus mirror and distort Hero and her father?</b></div>
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John! Oh I could go on and on about my love for John Glover. He is a master of play. Sharing a stage with him is not only wickedly fun, but also immensely educational. He has an ease with the language that just floors me. Playing his daughter Hero, though, was a very different task from playing his niece Cressida. Mostly because Hero and Cressida are about as different as you can get. In <i>Much Ado</i> you have a dutiful, sweet, almost repressive father-daughter relationship. In our production of Troilus and Cressida, Pandarus has all but raised Cressida, but not at all as a Hero. They behave as contemporaries (whether or not that may be the reality) — they mock and tease each other mercilessly, constantly trying to one-up each other.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mendes as Hero with Lily Rabe's Beatrice<br />
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<b>In our conversation about <i>Much Ado</i>, you mentioned that the Delacorte’s environment & thrust stage forced you to be “smarter & more aware” of your acting choices. What strategies will you revisit this time around? Anything you’ll do differently?</b></div>
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My vocal work in this show is very different. Hero was in many ways a kind of woman-child. Cressida is a woman in every regard. She is a survivor and a force of nature. Because of this my pre show vocal warm-ups have changed. There is also the difference of period vs. contemporary costumes. I have a lot more freedom in this production. It is <i>so</i> nice not having to speak Shakespeare in a corset.</div>
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<b>Also last time around, you mentioned wanting to play Juliet and Perdita. Have you had those chances yet? or any other Shakespearean or classical roles you’ve played in the last two years? Do you have any Shakespearean dream-roles traditionally played by men?</b></div>
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I’ve got the Cressida bug. Now, instead of Juliet and Perdita, I’m hankering to play Rosalind and Lady M. I'm entering a period in my life where the appeal of playing teenagers has pretty much disappeared.<br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The Public Theater's free Shakespeare in the Park stages <i><a href="http://publictheater.org/Tickets/Calendar/PlayDetailsCollection/SITP/troilusandcressida/" target="_blank">Troilus and Cressida</a> </i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">from July 19 to August 14 at the Delacorte in Central Park. Tickets are free.</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>headshot</b> Hannah Sherman</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>photos #2 & 3</b> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Joan Marcus</span></div>
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</span>Aaron Grunfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11984978554994244178noreply@blogger.com0