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Blackfriars Conference 2013 — Colloquy Session I: Staging Choices

Greetings: Charlene V. Smith here, live blogging  from the Tyson Center, Colloquy Session I: Staging Choices, which runs from 2:30pm to 3:45pm. Jemma Levy is the chair for this session and the presenters are Matthew Carter, Annette Drew-Bear, Andrew Harvey, Donald Hedrick, Claire Huber, Claire Kimball, and Angelina LaBarre.

This colloquy is about staging choices; Levy points out that the papers are eclectic, dealing with choices from a number of different angles.

Carter’s paper is about the use of weapons as indicators of characters in Romeo and Juliet, specifically looking at outsiderness and ethnicity. His argument is that since modern audience will no longer recognize the ethnicity attached to stage combat and weaponry, we need to identify these differences in other ways, possibly through costume. Levy asks how using costume to indicate ethnicity is different from what already happens through costume design. Carter suggests that costume designers may need to look more into combat and weapon based visual signifiers. Spanish style fighting was cut-centric instead of stab-centric, for example. Another example: Capulet calls for his long sword, implying an older style of fighting, which an early modern audience would have recognized as inappropriate for the fight. The participants discuss what information an audience may or may not recognize through modern or early modern weapons. Carter says he is convinced that a modern audience is more finely tuned to costume design than weaponry technology.

LaBarre’s paper explores the question of stage management in the early modern theatre through her experience as a member of MBC’s MFA in Shakespeare and Performance 2012-2013 company, Roving Shakespeare. She investigates different terms that were present during the early modern era that may have been equivalent to a modern day stage manager and the responsibilities of these positions. For example, medieval prompters would be placed in the center-front of the stage and would prompt not only lines, but also movements with the use of a guiding stick. Later the stage manager domain shifts to backstage due to greater spectacle and increased technology. Levy points out even today a stage manager’s duties can vary greatly from production to production and director to director, musing that the shifts in terms and definitions historically continue for that position to this day. Hedrick asks about how the hierarchy of these positions have shifted over time. LaBarre points out that the high status of the book keeper in the early modern theatre stems partially from the fact that the book keeper had access to the play’s full text.

Drew-Bear wrote on the staging of evil in Lust’s Dominion (possibly written by Thomas Dekker). Drew-Bear refers to the character of the machiavellian Moor (Eleazar) as a playwright, and LaBarre, connecting to her paper, suggests that he might actually be more of a book keeper. Drew-Bear’s paper explores the metatheatricality of Eleazar and his text. Lust’s Dominion has a play-within in which Eleazar sets up the staging and tells the actors what to do in a pseudo-rehearsal. Drew-Bear points out that Eleazar is quite self-conscious in his use of theatrical terms. Levy asks whether there is an implication that Eleazar is performing the role of villain, as opposed to actually being a villain. Drew-Bear thinks it is more accurate that Eleazar is revealing in the role of villain as opposed to suggesting that he is, at heart, someone else.

Kimball’s paper argues that we should re-embrace The Bloody Banquet as a prime example of Jacobean revenge drama and identifies elements in the play that would be appealing to a modern audience. Kimball is fOCSinated by the fact that this play contains so many theatrical elements and yet modern companies are unfamiliar or uninterested in this play. She loves both the gore and violence, but also the number of staging repetitions that are set up in the play. For example, the play contains a pre-banquet in addition to the titular banquet. Kimball says part of the viability of the play can be found in the title. An audience is expecting to see a bloody banquet, an expectation which is frustrated by the inclusion of a first banquet that isn’t the bloody one. Carter asks how Kimball would recommend situating this play to make it marketable. Kimball suggests linking it with other violent or Jacobean pieces such as Titus Andronicus or The Duchess of Malfi. (As possibly the only person in this room other than Kimball to have read this play, I heartily support her recommendation to stage it!)

Harvey’s paper is on Julius Caesar, arguing that Brutus exemplifies Aristotle’s definition of the Noble Man and is the moral center of the play. With that line of thought, Caesar’s ghost cannot be a manifestation of Brutus’ guilty conscience. Levy asks what journey this leaves the actor playing Brutus and Harvey says he sees the character as static and as one that doesn’t have a journey. As a staging choice, Harvey suggests having Caesar’s ghost come from the trap, indicating to an audience that he is a malevolent spirit.

Hedrick’s paper looks at Henry V’s wooing scene with Katherine as part of a larger work on the arousal of monarchs in history plays. Hendrick questions how arousal might be played. He provides a scale of options: 1. Do nothing physically, using only the language of love. 2. A la Laurence Olivier, saddle up close to your acting partner. 3. Monty Python approach, with a wink wink, nudge nudge to the audience or let the other actors react to or point out the arousal. 4. the Lysistrata method. Hendrick points out that James was against the use of codpieces in costumes. He asks how we point out the possible subversiveness / comic effect of an aroused monarch for a modern audience? LaBarre suggests that both comedy and violence lives in all these choices. Levy asks at what point would an audience member be removed from the play and miss moments as they process a large prosthetic or a naked appendage. Carter points out that the Princess in Henry V is body-centric while learning English, which might suggest something about how she would react to a possible erection.

Blackfriars Conference 2013 — Paper Session #1

Hello!  Whitney Egbert here, liveblogging our first paper session of the 2013 Blackfriars Conference from 1:00pm to 2:15pm.  The session is being moderated by Herb Weil from the University of Manitoba, with help from OCS actors John Harrell, Chris Johnston, and Tim Sailer.

Kara Northway, Kansas State University
 “[M]y spirit is moved, the fire is kindled, and I must speake”: Nathan Field’s Epistolary Defense of the Vocation of Player

Northway will be discussing Field’s life off the stage and his letter known as The Remonsterance, and his argument with Sutton.

In this epistolary defense, Field refers to his profession as an actor as “my poor talent,” acting as “harmless matters of delight,” and rebuts the arguments from clergyman Sutton against the deeds of actors in that what they do is from their god given talent.

A fun quote from Field –  “you waited very low in your hatred of us.”

Field asserted that a sermon was meant to be the winning of souls not demoralizing as Sutton was doing – Field then said that his point was that there are “faults in all professions.” Oh isn’t that the truth!

Northway closes with points about the fact that letters could get similar publicity to poetry through manuscript circles, which seems an interesting point to me and one that might be interesting to learn more about.

Lindsey Snyder, Gallaudet University
 Speak Hands for Me: Why Shakespeare Scholars, Educators, and Performers Need American Sign Language

Snyder’s work at Gallaudet, a school for the deaf, and her paper is about the work and how teaching Shakespeare to deaf students is different from teaching hearing students.  Snyder talks about how all the work starts with translation as everything has to be translated into American Sign Language (ASL).  Snyder talks about the difference in her classes – starting with a voice class won’t work; tension is held in her students around making sound so getting them to even make a sigh can be difficult.  The idea of the gallop can be hard for students to understand – their rhythm is different than ours.  But ASL brings in the idea of hold and release – two sit (one tap of fingers on the other hand) in a chair (two taps) always has a hold between.

Snyder talks about some productions – a production of Richard 3 where Richard was deaf and Anne was hearing which created a beautiful landscape of hold and release; a Hamlet production directed by deaf students where the ghost was a projection on the back wall of just hands (AMAZING!!)

UH OH … THE THUNDER!!  Snyder is going to skip ahead for times sake …

Snyder is directing an upcoming production of Richard 3; from that she and John Harrell perform one of the monologues, Snyder using the ASL translation she has created.  The visuals are beautiful.

Snyder wants to encourage future research into how the relationship with ASL can further the rest of our work.  I am particularly intrigued by the difference in tension and the idea of hold and release.

ADDENDUM: A question was asked after all the papers had been presented about how breathe plays into Snyder’s work – she spoke to her own work in translating during a performance.  Snyder’s relationship with the OCS has allowed her to get to know many of the actors so that she can fall into their breathing rhythm, use some of their gestures, etc.  Working elsewhere can be harder as the breath does matter to allowing her to live in the same space and time as the actors.


 Ben Curns, American Shakespeare Center
Richard: Portrait of a Serial Killer

Curns is going to discuss his research as he prepared to play Richard in Richard 3, specifically the characteristics that have been connected to serial killers.

The first characteristic Curns discusses is fetal brain injury which Curns believes that Shakespeare establishes through the Duchess of York as she describes his birth.

Second characteristic – the upbringing with his parents – York loves to tell everyone that they are the rightful bloodline to the monarchy and when Richard kills, he gets his fathers praise and love.  Richard also learns from his father that women (like Joan de Pucel who York kills) are not to be trusted.  And then there is the isolation – many serial killers (and their mothers) have talked about how they were set apart from the start from other children or siblings.

Third characteristic – fantasy – as Richard watches Edward marry Elizabeth Woodville, he then turns to imagining winning the crown.

Curns believes that Richard does not kill Anne or the princes in the tower to secure his crown but rather because he is addicted to killing.

The final characteristic is fetishes – Curns believes (but does not want to spend much time elaborating on) that Richard exhibits signs of fetishes with both stabbing and necrosatism.

ADDENDUM – A question was asked of Curns after all the papers were through about how some of these factors played out in performance for him.  Curns spoke about how in the scene with Lady Anne, Richard is, as many serial killers do, returning to his greatest crime, the killing of Henry VI, and so feels, in that scene, more mOCSuline, more sexually aroused than any other time in the play. It certainly creates a stronger reason for Richard to approach Anne then than at any other time.

Darlene Farabee, University of South Dakota
My Kingdom for a Boat

Farabee is discussing “The Poor Man’s Comfort” (by Robert Daborne) and how the nautical language used in so many of the plays at the time changes the meaning and setting.  It would, as Farabee points out, require actors and an audience that are knowledgable about the nautical terms and their multiple meanings

Harrell, Johnston and Sailer join us for a scene – made all the better by Johnston’s donning of a skirt and a lady’s demeanor. At least for a moment.

I missed who said it but Farabee quotes that audience members come to the theatre ready for a voyage – I really love that thought.


Sarah Werner, Folger Shakespeare Library
Fragmentation

Werner will be discussing how fragments of performances are now being used to teach and discuss productions and what we might be losing from that usage.

Going from reading to performance can be hard enough – from your own imagining to someone else’s vision of it – but to then take a performance and chop it up, you lose so much more – “it leaves the text whole” but it simplifies the presentation.  Werner also makes the point that the more we allow this, the more we will lose the productions that are possible; the more we ignore the problem, the more we miss the patterns that are visible only through the whole production. “What damage are we doing breaking the whole into fragments?”

“Why do we prioritize the convenience of clips over the messiness of art?” – a poignant question by Werner.

Werner’s use of Harrell was delightful – he delivered a speech, and then, throughout the remainder of her presentation, he would suddenly arise and deliver a few lines of that speech or other well known speeches.  A truly wonderful example of her point.

Matt Kozusko, Ursinus College
 Why Are Shakespeare’s Characters so Relatable?

 Kozusko is discussing how characters are both relatable AND “relatable.”

Since, as we all know, the language is the first hurdle – how can we say they are actually relatable?  We are seeking to understand the words, the many meanings, the deep thoughts but “we know we can all misunderstand him as well.”

In speaking about a Punchdrunk performance of Macbeth, Kozusko says that Lady Macbeth becomes “not so much relatable but related” – the performers use well known physical actions to create Lady M so what exactly are we relating to in those moments: a character? A stereotype?  Is that really relating?

Kozusco asserts that student relations with Shakespeare’s characters often times need “chaperoning” – not only because there are many selling an easy way to understand but because if we are preemptive, then bad relationships don’t get in their first.

Kozusko’s closing was a great, striking theme for us all and how I will close my blog for today: “getting Shakespeare right matters to all of us” – we might not always get it right but we sure can try.

Wake-up Workshop: “A Certain Text”

Good morning and welcome to the first session of the 2013 Blackfriars Conference. My name is Ashley Pierce, and I will be live blogging the first session, a Wake-up Workshop “A certain text” with Natalia Razak that took place Tuesday October 23rd 8:00 to 8:45 AM. This is the first ever Wake-up Workshop with the American Shakespeare Center and Blackfriars Conference, as part of the education program within the OCS, dealing this morning with scansion. This is a means to showcase what the education program brings to schools.

Razak invited 11 of this morning’s gathering to join her on stage, asking them to sit upon the gallant stools located on the stage. She had the volunteers each take a syllable from Shakespeare’s line “To be or not to be; that is the question…” from Hamlet. Coupling up the volunteers into pairs, she had the person to the right of each pair sit down while the second person stood, to emphasis the iambic pentameter. She then had the group go through the line, saying their syllable to show the stressed and unstressed syllables. Then moving the topic onto the feminine endings, she asked the group what this could infer on the line. Some answers were, disoriented, questioning, hesitation, weak, etc, with Razak adding that she did not think she “has cracked the feminine ending.” The next step was to do this same exercise, with the quarto version of this same text, “To be or not to be; ay there’s the point…” Going through the same process, this time highlighting the trochaic stresses, Razak noted that this makes it a discovery. She then asked the group to try this again without stressing the “ay” to see if it is more an internal shift, making Hamlet more of a thinker, showing how this experiment/exercise can teach as well as play with Shakespeare’s text. The workshop then moved into a speech of Biron’s from Love’s Labour’s Lost. Razak gave the attendees a copy of this speech and had them each read a line, in a “read around.”

Razak then talked about how the OCS actors will scan and paraphrase their lines before the first rehearsal to help put everyone on the same page, so the director knows what the actors think and can see if it is what they are thinking as well. This is to ensure that the actors know exactly what they are saying and to make sure the audience knows as well. Razak then asked the attendees to locate a pen, asking them to take a couple of moments and paraphrase the line they had previously read. Due to time constraints, she then asked if anyone had a paraphrase they were proud of or had a difficult time with that the group could explore; unfortunately not everyone could read what they discovered. One attendee mentioned that “time” was a hard word to paraphrase, saying that she came up with chronology, Cronus, hours. Showing that some words were difficult to find a new word for since it was so tied into our common language. Razak then moved forward to look at mid-line breaks, caesuras, with the group, to trouble why a character would pause in the middle of a line. She asked how this feels when reading and hearing this harsh break in the line, as well as talked about how this effects the breath control of the actor speaking the line.

As an attendee said when you have to take a breath it takes the person out of a thinking place and moving them into a feeling place. Attendees left this workshop with this thought to ponder as they moved on to the next session of the day.

Introducing the BFC13 Blogging Team

As we did in 2011, OCS Education will be live-blogging the Blackfriars Conference in its entirety. Every Plenary, Staging, and Colloquy Session, as well as lunch meet-ups and assorted other events, will have a devoted post here on the blog, updated in real-time, so that those of you who can’t join us in Staunton next week will still be able to follow along with the proceedings. I am pleased and proud to introduce the following individuals who will be helping me to document the 7th Blackfriars Conference in all its glory:

Whitney Egbert
 Whitney has been a theatre actor for 20 years.  She has been based in NYC for 4 years, adding work in the midwest and east coast to her west coast beginnings.  She has been the Managing Director for The Shakespeare Forum in NYC for the past year. She has been a teaching artist with Shakesperience Productions, Inc., Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, The Shakespeare Forum, South Dakota Shakespeare Festival, and LaGuardia Community College.  Theatre credits include: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Love’s Labour’s Lost (The Shakespeare Forum); As You Like It (South Dakota Shakespeare Festival); Platonov (Columbia Stages); Romeo and Juliet (Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival); Much Ado About Nothing, Othello (Hip to Hip Theatre); Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar (Shakesperience Productions); Fat Pig, It’s A Wonderful Life: A Radio Play (Salem Repertory). B.A.: University of Portland. www.whitneyjegbert.com

Nora Manca
 Nora Manca is a 2nd year MLitt student working on her thesis on Shakespeare as an Other. She was the founding artistic director of Storefront Shakespeare in Chicago.  After graduating Nora plans to establish a new professional Shakespeare theater company, probably in New Orleans.  

Sarah Martin
 Sarah Martin is a second year M.Litt student at Mary Baldwin College. She is originally from Florida and holds a BA in Theatre from Florida State University.

Ashley Pierce
 Ashley Pierce is a current student in her second year at Mary Baldwin Colleges Shakespeare and Performance program. Holding a B.A. from Florida Southern College and a A.A. from Northampton Community College both in Theatre Arts Performance, her background is primarily in performance. As an actor, direction, costume designer, stage manager and much more, she had a firm understanding of play performance from original concept to opening nights. 

Charlene Smith
 Charlene V. Smith is an actor and director from Washington, DC and co-founder of Brave Spirits Theatre. She has a BA in English and theatre from the College of William and Mary and studied at the London Dramatic Academy. She is currently in her final year of the MLitt/MFA program in Shakespeare and Performance at Mary Baldwin College.

Clare Von Rueden
 Clare Von Rueden graduated from Ave Maria University with a degree in literature.  The majority of her stage work has been centered in violin performance, but she has been helping with plays since high school. Her love of Shakespeare began with a love of literature, and some of her first Shakespeare memories come from reading Shakespeare out loud with a group of friends in high school, and having lengthy conversations about Shakespeare with her sister. She is currently a second year in the Shakespeare and Performance program at Mary Baldwin College.

Molly Zeigler
Molly Zeigler is a post-bac student with the Shakespeare and Performance program. Her major areas of focus include Shakespearean dramaturgy, directing, and theatre history. Molly received her MA in Shakespearean Studies from the Shakespeare Institute in Stratford-upon-Avon. From Buffalo, New York, she is happy to be back this side of the pond and she’s excited about studying with another world-class institution. Molly is the proud Mom of eight year old Isabel and she looks forward to sharing her passion with family, friends, and future students.

Those of us on Twitter will also be making quick updates there, so follow #BFC13 for those tidbits. Check out the schedule of events on the OCS website, and come back here starting at 8am, Wednesday, October 23rd for all of our real-time updates.

“If’t be summer news, smile to’t before”

Accolades for OCSTC 13 Session 1 CampersWhoever dubbed this time of year “the lazy days of summer” sure didn’t work for OCS Education. We’re much more about “the very Midsummer madness”. Perhaps most prominently, this is the time when we host the annual OCS Theatre Camps for high school students. We’re in the  middle of Session 2 now, with students deep into work on The Taming of the Shrew, Richard II, and Ben Jonson’s Volpone. Their final performances are on Sunday, August 4th. Though it can sometimes feel like the camps dwarf all other activity during the summer, they are far from the extent of OCS Education’s aestival programming — and this year, we seem to have more going on than ever before.

Since 2010, we have also held a summer camp for adults, the No Kidding Shakespeare Camp. This summer, we’re taking the show on the road and heading to London for a week exploring Shakespeare’s old haunts. Several friends of the OCS, including MBC Professor Mary Hill Cole, archaeologist Julian Bowsher, eminent Oxford scholar Dr. Tiffany Stern, Globe Education Director Patrick Spottiswoode, craftsman Peter McCurdy, and director and actor Nick Hutchison, are graciously sharing their time and expertise with the group. Our travels will take us to many important London monuments, as well as some lesser-known gems, including: the Bloomsbury and Covent Garden districts, the Globe, the new Wanamaker Theatre, Shoreditch, St. Bartholomew’s, St. Paul’s, the National Portrait Gallery, several of the colleges of Oxford, the Blackfriars District, Guildhall, the Inns of Court, Southwark Cathedral, the Museum of London, the British Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum, where Ralph is delivering a lecture on the early modern Blackfriars Theatre and our Blackfriars Playhouse as part of the “Shakespearean London Theatres” series. We’ll see A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Macbeth at the Globe and One Man, Two Guv’nors at the Haymarket. We’ll also be exploring London’s culinary delights, from traditional pubs to Thai and curries. It hardly seems possible with all of those scheduled wonders, but we’ll also all have some time to explore the city on our own. (I’m hoping to catch a musical in the West End on one of our free nights, since, as I’ve confessed before, musical theatre is another of my great loves). Since I’m something of a photo-hound, I’m sure I will return with many, many pictures of our adventures, so look for those on Facebook and in an upcoming blog post, and if you follow me on Twitter (@OCS_Cass), I’ll be posting real-time updates with hashtag #NKSC13.

Summer is also a great time for Educator Resources. In 2011, we began hosting Summer Seminars in addition to our already-established school-year programs, and two weeks ago, we hosted the 2013 Summer Special Teacher Seminar, welcoming teachers from Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Tennessee, and Michigan. This seminar was a “Class to Cast” special, focusing on methods of producing a Shakespeare play in the classroom or as an after-school activity. We covered everything from cutting and doubling to audition techniques, from tablework to blocking and embedded stage directions, from marketing to music. You can hear the playlist we built for The Comedy of Errors on Spotify, and the Study Guide we used is available on Lulu. Here are just a few of the comments we received from teachers who attended this seminar:

  • “This was the best and most useful workshop I have ever taken.” — Martin Jacobs, Lincoln High School, Ypsilanti MI
  • “I would love to attend Class to Cast again. I feel comfortable with Shakespeare as an English teacher, but I knew very little about directing. This seminar gave me a good sense of the overall process of putting on a show, including things like stage management and marketing, which, as an English teacher, I probably would have overlooked. I learn something new and understand my prior knowledge even better every time I come to a seminar, so I would definitely come back. … Most of my other professional development experiences have been full of generalities without actionable suggestions. I can see direct applications of the techniques from this seminar, such as scansion, reading from cue scripts, and cutting the text, to my classroom.” — anonymous
  • “AMAZINGLY helpful! I would recommend this (and have!) and will be returning.” — Jeffrey Cole, Director of Education, Henley Street Theatre/Richmond Shakespeare
  • “I am used to attending seminars that are presented in a strictly academic manner. This seminar called upon me to participate fully, heart, mind, and , body in exciting ways. … I would not hesitate to recommend the seminar to a high school drama or English teacher. My first thought at the end of each day was that I didn’t want it to end. My first thought at the completion of the seminar was, “When can I take another OCS seminar?” The instructors were extraordinarily knowledgeable, creative, and articulate. Now, I understand why so many of the people taking the seminar return again and again.” — Barbara Johnson, Drama Instructor, Faith Christian School
  • “I will be back for sure! This was an AWESOME workshop! … Cass and Sarah were exceptional hosts and provided a wide-reaching program that really helped to capture and address some of my hesitance with approaching Shakespeare. With greater confidence, I plan to embrace the Bard this upcoming fall!” — anonymous

We were thrilled to welcome so many enthusiastic educators, and we thank them for being willing to step outside of their comfort zones for a few days. Best of luck to them as they take on the challenge of directing in their schools! And we hope to see everyone back for future seminars.

Summer is also, as Sarah noted back in June, high tide for our flow of interns. Our offices are teeming over with eager students, working on a variety of different projects. Just this week, we welcomed Ellington, a rising senior at Oberlin University, who will be working on media and technology for us. Jess, who will be with us through the fall, is preparing dramaturgy packets for the upcoming Actors’ Renaissance Season. Emily has joined the World’s Mine Oyster troupe, preparing materials for The Merry Wives of Windsor as well as helping with their workshop prep. Self-described “jack of all trades” intern Sadie is helping out with Hospitality, Development, and the Box Office, and Sara has delved into our archives. To keep up with our fabulous interns and their research, following the OCS Interns’  Blog.

So, once the summer ends, do things slow down at all? Not in the least. As soon as schools are back in session, we begin welcoming groups for tours, workshops, and Little Academes, as well as starting our regular Student Matinee schedule and the Blackfriars Lecture Series. Our Fall Teacher Seminar is October 4-6th, focusing on Romeo and Juliet and All’s Well That Ends Well. And, of course, the 7th Blackfriars Conference occurs at the end of October. Acceptance letters for plenary papers and colloquy sessions will go out next week, and then we set to work finalizing the schedule, arranging banquets, preparing entertainment, printing programs and nametags, arranging catering, and shepherding all the other miscellany that go into making the Blackfriars Conference a unique and valuable experience for all of the scholars and practitioners who attend. Like the OCS’s Artistic Department, performing shows 52 weeks a year, OCS Education is truly a year-round institution, and we hope that you’ll come to the Blackfriars Playhouse soon — or talk to about bringing our Education Artists to you, wherever you are.