History Comes Alive...in a Basement

"Can no man tell me of my unthrifty son?" Henry IV asks of Hal at the beginning of Henry IV Part I. These days, it's a juggling act in the rehearsal room. What scene are we doing? Which act? Who am I playing this time? Wait...what PLAY is this?

Yes, what play indeed. We are rehearsing Henry IV Part 1 and Part 2 simultaneously. What a great amount of theatre ASP is generating with this production; and what a fitting way to usher in the fall and kick off their seventh season.

As always, Shakespeare's words are the guiding light in the room, only to be matched by the intelligent and probing minds of the actors taking the story on. Fifteen big talents meander in and out of the coveted basement in Harvard Square six days a week to analyze and bring to life the text. "How can you make what you want ok to get?" one actor asks during an early table work session.

Henry IV takes the crown from his cousin, Richard II. Hal rebels against his future as king by fraternizing with drunks and prostitutes. If nothing else, the chemistry between Hotspur (Allyn Burrows) and Lady Percy (Sarah Newhouse) is so precious, that as an observer sometimes I think love can conquer all. Then we start work on the next scene, and I remember Henry IV is primarily wrought with familial turmoil and the waging of wars instead.

I go in the next room to get a five foot sword for someone to hold. Douglass kills Blunt in under two minutes. We go on dinner break. We come back and Hotspur is about to demolish Hal at the end of Part One. Who's going to win? Only you can cheer on the opponents when history comes alive Sept 29.

Melanie Garber
AD

Right. This text is immediate and we're thick in it. A massive story, and a feast. If we do it justice, and we're throwing ourselves that direction, there'll be every reason to see both.

MY WOUNDS AKE AT THEE

Who is not Timon's. What heart, head, sword, force, means but is Lord Timon's?

Fully entrenched in the rehearsal process, I find myself now with these verbiages from the text. Shakespeare's work (and/or whoever else) tends to stay with you...and with a room full of high caliber performers such as this one the story is becoming a vivd dream to me, whilst awake and even when I'm asleep.

These melodious eight creatures that make up the cast of Timon are creating a world that demands twenty three characters of them--and counting. With a hat, a change in posture, a different register of voice each storyteller figure flows into the next as this ensemble drudges up and dusts of the sometimes forgotten meaning of what it means to play in a theatrical context. In large part, if there isn't a sense of joy in the creating, then why do it in the first place? Any other reason is married to ego and hype. I'm honored to watch these professionals be betrothed to the text and constantly work towards serving it in an intelligent, engaging and clear manner.

TIMON OF WHO?

Timon of Athens. Who wrote that?

Though the answer to this question seems to be woefully unknown to many, and debated by an even smaller sum, Timon has luckily found a home with ASP this season.

It has been quite the productive and not uneventful week for us. Bill was nearly kept asunder from the group by the great European ash oddity of 2010. Thankfully, however, our fearless leader ended up missing only....our first rehearsal. Impressive? Yes. But that's Bill for you.

Through his compassionate approach and wildly inventive mind, he has already started to sculpt the piece quite clearly. More specifically, the text itself stands to resonate with today's economic climate, and then some.

This accessibility is no small feat, especially since most of these characters are not the nicest of fellows. As one actor jokingly put it after an initial read through, "I get to play a dazzling array of assholes."

I'm excited to keep working. Laughter is hearty and frequent. Conversation is probing and rich. Plus, if nothing else, how many productions can say that they rehearsed sans director for their first rehearsal? It has to be less than a baker's dozen, I'm sure.

Taking on Timon

We're very excited to have launched our latest production, "Timon of Athens", which will be presented from May 19-June 13 at Midway Studios in Fort Point Channel. Part satire, part tragedy, "Timon" tackles complex themes of greed, hubris, and the power of money. Contemporary audiences will find many parallels to our current economic situation in this tale of financial management gone awry.

Rehearsals began this week and our brilliant cast is already hard at work developing their characters and shaping the interactions that will engage the audience in "Timon". Under the insightful leadership of director Bill Barclay, we've begun -scene by scene - to flesh out the production and to assess how a variety of influences, including Beckett, Kandinsky, and Brecht will help us tell the "Timon" story.

We look forward to sharing the details of our progress and hope to see you at Midway!

Hey cuz, thanks for vistiting. We're thrilled with how Othello is going and we're eagerly anticipating digging in on that crazy Timon of Athens. Please do consider coming to our Gala on April 17. The more the merrier! See you soon,

Allyn

Collaboration Continues to Yield Confidence and Learning

Watching my students work with Robert Walsh is freshly inspiring every year. Eliot Short Term Treatment has just completed its fourth year of collaboration with the Actors' Shakespeare Project, and each year has seen students taking their learning and performances to new heights. For the past four weeks, Bob Walsh has helped my students use both the pen and the stage to access Shakespeare's language and storytelling, and as they've examined love, jealousy, loyalty, and betrayal in Othello, they've come to see the themes and circumstances of their own lives mirrored in a story so old it is difficult even to read. As in years past, it was again a powerful experience to watch my students explore the possibility that to struggle may be universally human, that their circumstances may not be as isolating as they seem. Once again, as I watched Bob challenge my students to dig into their characters' desires and fears, I saw them digging into themselves.

Largely through Bob's tirelessness and passion, our collaboration has gained greater depth and breadth each year. True to form, this year saw the most powerful and dynamic student performances yet, with students staging three scenes from Othello for an audience of peers, caseworkers, actors, clinicians, teachers, administrators, and group care workers. With student input stronger than ever, student voice this year guided script edits, fight choreography, blocking, and live sound. Students collaborated in the development of original soundtracks for their scenes using audio recording technology, and in a moment of great creative insight, one student envisioned and put forth a teleprompter design that allowed students to perform without scripts in hand for the first time ever. Though both acting and performing for an audience were new and challenging experiences for every student, not a single student expressed upon reflection the sentiment that exploring Shakespeare through a more traditional classroom approach would have been better. Robert Walsh and ASP have once again helped my students discover fun in academia and contemporary significance in the arcane. Perhaps most importantly, ASP has helped my students find the courage to engage with and embrace something new. No matter the context or subject, real learning requires courage, and my students have proven themselves brave indeed. As one student wrote in response to the famous line from Julius Caesar:

I move forward with my life and rely on what's mine.

Can’t rewind for my past I left behind

They say, “Cowards die many times before their deaths.”

Well, I choose to fight until I have nothing left.

-DM

Evan Gentler

English Teacher, ESTT

...and my personal favorite, the stage manager giving last minute instructions (with Resident Company member Bobbie Steinbach in the audience - see her comments below on the show!)

Jason Bowen leading the cast in a group warm up and inspirational speech, flanked by Peter Quince and Flute the bellows mender (you can just make out Marketing Director Laura Sullivan in the background)...

...Seth Bodie teaching Oberon's fairies how to apply false eyelashes...

A photo's worth 1,000 words...

Last night was the final dress for BAA's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream and here are some photos of the cast and crew putting the FINAL touches on!




Titania and one of Oberon's fairies applying make-up and nail polish for a fully polished look! (as designed by Seth Bodie)

Naps, knifes, and neck snapping

Being a violence designer has apparently skewed Rob Najarian’s sense of beauty. During rehearsal when he declared, “That is a lovely picture,” he was not describing an early embrace between Desdamona and Othello or even one of Cassio and Bianca’s saucy entanglements. No, he was gushing about how Roderigo (played by Doug Lockwood) wielded his knife a few inches above Cassio’s (Michael Forden Walker) head as they began their deadly duet in scene V.1.

Devising violence for Shakespeare requires an alchemist’s expertise (as illustrated by last fall's post on the sausage tests required for Taming of the Shrew). Minimal stage directions, e.g. “They fight”, must be transformed into realistic brawls with a wide variety of weapons. Each switch of a blade, slap across a face, and snap of a neck must be broken down into minute details. Actors who may not have extensive stage combat training must quickly grasp all the nuances to safely execute maneuvers while keeping the Elizabethan dialogue rolling. And, unlike dance, performers can rarely rely on music to set a cohesive rhythm for the group.

Watching Rob bounce back and forth crafting jabs, thrusts, and falls for all the killings in Othello, is oddly enough thoroughly entertaining. Somehow he manages to remember each person’s individual sequence of movements complete with grunts and moans (his falsetto version of Desdamona ironically slayed everyone watching), maintain a narrative logic within the fight, and pepper his instructions with $5 words like penumbra.

If you are curious to know more about this bloody craft, feel free to check out my interview with Rob about fight choreography from Monkeyhouse's blog.



Karen Krolak
Assistant Director

The Final Countdown!

I think I want to use this blog basically to toot the horn of the amazing student Stage Manager on the Midsummer Night's Dream that Jason Bowen and Magda Spasiano are directing at Boston Arts Academy. I went to a couple of hours of rehearsal on Monday afternoon (their final dress is this afternoon!) just to see if anyone needed any help. Every in the room continues to work so, so very hard on the show - Russ Swift, the lighting designer, was there on one side of the tech table, tweaking the timing on lights. Jason (who along with Magda is also designing the sound), sad on the other side of the tech table tweaking the volume of the final sound cue so both it and Puck's final speech could be heard. Jenna Lord, the scenic designer, and Seth Bodie, the costume designer, were not only putting the final touches on their design elements but continuing their role as teachers by filling the students in on theater etiquette (always check with the costume designer or wardrobe supervisor before you grab your costume off of the rack for the first time; the bag that holds your small costume pieces is a "ditty bag"). On the other side of the room sat three ASL interpreters, watching rehearsal to learn the script for the performance for which they will be interpreting.

And in the middle of everything and everyone, sat the stage manager. Now, she has not done this before. She is a junior in high school who never took blocking before, never wrote a cue into a script, never called a cue before. But there she was, calling the room to attention, telling everyone where to start and when, writing down all of the new blocking that comes in the final moments of rehearsal when new props are added and new scene changes require new entrances, setting the props table, keeping everyone informed of where and what and who and when! My favorite moment came during the scene when Puck and the fairies put the lovers to sleep so Puck can erase the erroneous charms on the men. The direction required Puck to give a specific hand signal on a specific line and the lovers to respond to this magic in a specific way so that a "button" sound and light cue can happen (a "button" cue is one that happens in a zero count usually on a specific movement or word so that it is extremely essential that it be spot on because a mistake will be more noticeable than on a cue that lasts, say 20 seconds). And the Stage Manager nailed it each and every time. She was able to communicate to Jason and to the actors what she needed in order to make it happen - consistency of movement and of speech rhythm. Her calling of the cues feels and looks like the culmination of everyone's weeks of work - the lights, the sound, the costumes, the words, she brings them all together and BOOM! she makes them go! She puts the poetry in motion. The beauty everyone imagined on paper, in the flourescently lit rehearsal room....she says Sound Cue A and Light Cue 1 go....and the beauty is realized.

Laura and I will be headed over today to watch their final dress and I can't wait to watch the stage manager call an entire show. I have no doubt it will be astounding.

See you there!
Adele
Manager of Artistic Operations

Moving into the space

Sunday's rehearsal was the last in the rehearsal room. Tomorrow begins a new phase: moving into the performance space at Villa Victoria in Boston. Scenes that take place on the grand curving staircase or on the balconies, entrances and exits through the double doors or the upper doors or via the ladder -- places that till now have been suggested in rehearsal by low platforms or signaled by taped lines on the floor, or that have just been implied, in thin air -- will now be physically realized.

"Into thin air" -- hard to imagine not having that expression available in English, but what if Shakespeare hadn't invented it in The Tempest? A few now-common phrases in English that come from Othello: "a foregone conclusion" . . . also, the expression, "to wear your heart upon your sleeve," something Iago says he will never do.

At every rehearsal new windows open for me onto the play. Seeing the actors do the lines, I'll suddenly get it -- I'll think: "So THAT's what that line is for! That's WHY he says that! NEEDS to say it, at that exact moment! THIS is where she finally realizes it. THAT's when he suddenly feels the stab of it!" I find it infinitely fascinating, these glimpses into how the play works, how cunningly and intricately it's been composed. I love watching the actors make discoveries as they rehearse, and through watching and listening to them, I get to make them too. Often it's an actor's physical gesture, some movement or subtle intonation, that throws open the window in my mind. And then I'm amazed that I didn't see it before! But I didn't. The actors make it live. And then I think once again (as millions have before) how brilliant Shakespeare was at writing for the actors -- as well as for the rest of us.

Joyce Van Dyke
Dramaturg

First Look

Yesterday was our Open Rehearsal at The Garage. We do these for every production and to be honest - they're awesome! We invite the public into the rehearsal process for an hour to glimpse at the production while still in its raw form. It isn't just exciting and eye-opening for the audience but for the actors and production staff as well.

To work through scenes at rehearsal with audience reactions for the first time is interesting to observe. It gives the actors an energy boost of sorts. To hear laughter or gasps from people that haven't seen it 20 times before is both reaffirming and intimidating. What are they reacting to? What are did I do differently? As an actor you definitely enter a new "place" after the open rehearsal. It answers a lot of questions that you may have and at the same time keep starts some fresh ones.

For the audience it is an intimate look into our "world". One that not too many audience members get to see and no doubt they'll see something take place that they've never seen before - how the play comes to life. It also gives them a unique perspective on the actual performance when they see it all together. They can say "Oh, that has changed" or "I remember when they discovered that moment." It's quite rewarding as an audience member to have that knowledge.

'Til next time,
Laura
Marketing Manager

Layer Cake

Jason Bowen, Magda Spasiano and the Boston Arts Academy students have started their tech process!

I went to rehearsal on Tuesday afternoon to sit in on their last run through before going into tech. The previous week, Jason and Magda had met to go through the script and pencil in where they envisioned light and sound cues being placed. So I could already see some of the layers being built around the text. At least on paper. Tuesday I walked into the theater first, not knowing where the rehearsal was to take place and the new layers started to jump out at me. Jenna Lord, the scenic designer and one of the tech teachers at BAA, was in the theater painting the floor with three of her students. And it is stunning. The floor consists of swirls of bright color with poles of brightly colored limbs to represent the forest into which the lovers flee. The energy Jenna has managed to convey with this set exactly matches the energy the actors bring to Shakespeare's text.

After exploring the set, I walked over to the rehearsal room to watch the run and work a bit more with the student Stage Manager. The work she has done is just fantastic for a first time stage manager - her blocking can be understood by everyone who needs to reference it (actors, the director, designers), she keeps track of where everyone enters and exits and where they hide in between. We worked on creating props tracking paperwork and we talked through how to write sound and light cues into the stage management book. (SQ A & LQ3!). Russ Swift, the lighting designer for BAA, sat down with us at the stage management table to watch a run through and penciled the lighting cues Magda & Jason had placed into his script. So before the run through had even started, I could see two more layers being added to the text - set and lights.

The room, full of teenagers and adults, felt like a top spinning out of control - the students started their rehearsal time by warming up, Jason checking in with different people, everyone seeking his attention at once...and the NOISE. The kids have SO much energy and it is simply uncontrollable. Uncontrollable, that is, until Jason called places. It started to get more quiet and then the Stage Manager called "lights up" and complete silence fell. As soon as the actors started speaking Shakespeare's words, every single eye was glued to the stage, every word spoken in the room was Shakespeare's. The change was, quite simply, astounding.

As they moved through the play, I could see other layers that have been added. The first fairy entrance consisted of singing and dancing so I knew Sarah Hickler, choreographer extraordinaire had been there to work with the fairies. Then Oberon entered, wearing pieces of his costume - that would be Seth Bodie, costume designer and another tech teacher at BAA, hard at work. The actors executed the fight choreography that Robert Walsh had taught them a couple of weeks ago beautifully and different props started to make their appearance (a collaborative effort between Jason, Magda, Seth, Jenna, and ASP's Production Manager, Jason Ries). So even before the production started tech, I could see at work just how many people it took to bring the words to life. The kids could have stood in the dark in their street clothes speaking the text and it still would have been beautiful and their passion and talent would still have shown through. But now they have a foundation of the work of other gifted artisans to work upon. Tech started this morning - I can't wait to see it all put together as a whole!

More soon.
Adele Nadine Traub
Manager of Artistic Operations

Pre-Production Photos

As promised, some photos from our shoot last week.

Temptation scene

Last night the actors worked on the temptation scene, the tremendous central scene of the play. Here's some of what they said afterwards about how it felt to play the scene: terrifying and compelling . . . I can't believe I'm doing what I'm doing in this scene . . . it feels like I'm going through a whole play compressed into about 10 minutes, beginning with Othello in love with Desdemona and ending with his plan to murder her . . . an emotional roller-coaster and once you step onto it you can't get off . . . you can't believe it's happening but at the same time the psychological accuracy is so acute that you feel, yes, this is the way people ARE.

Joyce Van Dyke
Dramaturg

A picture is worth 1,000 words

We had our first photo shoot for Othello last night and it was really fantastic! This cast has such an incredible energy amongst them that it's hard not to feel it when you're in the room with them. And Nancy Leary has such an amazing vision for the costumes that is going to be translated beautifully on stage. Hopefully the pictures will be ready tomorrow and I can post them for all to see.

Things are coming together and it shows.

Cheers!
Laura

Fires in the Dark

Judy's been working intensively with members of the cast in small groups of twos and threes -- Othello and Desdemona (Jason Bowen and Brooke Hardman), Iago and Roderigo (Ken Cheeseman and Doug Lockwood)-- and then when everyone reassembles to work on the scenes in rehearsal, it's palpable how many more layers there are to the relationships, how they've been deepened and complicated. We saw this happen yesterday working on Act 1, which is such an exciting Act.

Shakespeare beat David Mamet to it: Mamet says start the conflict immediately and don't bother to explain it to the audience because we'll figure it out if we get excited and drawn in -- and that's what happens in Act 1: it's nighttime, people can't see each other clearly, they're shouting in the street, there are insults, mistaken identities, confusion, alarm, armed assaults -- and behind it all, Iago, "a moral pyromaniac setting fire to all of reality" (Harold Bloom).

As the actors worked the opening scenes you could feel the currents of energy surging more and more strongly through the rehearsal space where Jason Ries, ASP's Production Manager, has built a replica of the playing area they'll be using at Villa Victoria. The actors explored how everyone is pulled in many directions as a result of the sudden intersecting crises that butt up against one another in the opening scenes -- the intense personal crisis resulting from the Othello-Desdemona elopement, and the simultaneous public one of the military threat. People are moving fast through the streets at night -- the military machine's marching soldiers -- the angry civilians coming after Othello -- the political powers-that-be calling an emergency night meeting -- and the family in crisis whose passions spill over into the public setting.

Joyce Van Dyke
Dramaturg

Midsummer at the BAA

Yesterday, I ended up following Jason Bowen from rehearsal to rehearsal. First, I stopped in to the Midsummer Night's Dream rehearsal he is directing at the Boston Arts Academy. The students will perform the piece in their own black box theater and the difference between their theater and where ASP performed Midsummer really reminded me of how much a space can inform the play. The BAA space has no levels and is much smaller; the audience sits on all four sides of the playing space, forcing Jason to direct the actors to constantly stay on the move so they never forget one side or the other. Long, thin metal poles stand in for trees and the actors use them to create a feeling of being lost in the woods or to "hide" from one another or just to create a fun playing space. Yesterday was the first time they had worked with these poles so it took some getting used to - where once there was only empty space, now you could run right into a pole!
Most striking about the rehearsal though was the energy in the room. Those students are just boundless - running from one entrance to another, the lovers chasing each other, a couple of students were out sick so someone else would stand in for them, running from playing their own part to their new assignment. And the amount of support they give each other is astounding. Aside from the normal applause at the end of an act, the students gave each other laughter and congratulatory pats on the back when off stage, if someone went up on a line, someone would sneak a script into their line of sight. I loved watching their professionalism at work - something that Jason, Magda and the head of the theater department, Ms. Rodrigues works to teach them every day. From the first rehearsal I watched (when Jason had to remind students not to use their phones on stage) to this rehearsal (hearing them call for line like pros), the jump is astounding. In fact, Jason says one of the best parts of working with the students is, "witnessing the evolution of their professionalism." I loved watching the students who had only a line or two in our production of Midsummer take on the roles of Bottom, Oberon and Titania. These kids are hilarious!
Also in attendance at this rehearsal was company member Robert Walsh. He came to give the students his expertise on stage combat, working with them on the physical struggles between the lovers and Demetrius and Lysander. He taught them about safety and respect and then choreographed the moves and then stayed to see the run through, having a great time watching this incarnation of Bottom, the role Bob so recently played himself. Bob got a good chuckle or two out of the afternoon.
At the end of Midsummer rehearsal, I raced with Jason over to Cambridge where Othello rehearsals are being held. Othello has a little less comedy going on and the process has just begun. The actors spent the rehearsal reading and discussing the different aspects of what will be our Act I. I can't wait to see how things progress there!
Adele
Manager of Artistic Operations

Projects around Othello

ASP has a ton of stuff to be excited about going on outside of the Othello rehearsal room as well! Our own Othello and Desdemona (Jason Bowen and Brooke Hardman) will be working in the Charlestown High School two days a week. They will work with students on scenes from Othello. The really exciting thing about this is that these students have NEVER had a theater program in the high school!
Company member Robert Walsh (last seen as Bottom in Midsummer) will be working at the Eliot Treatment Facility for boys for days a week through March 4th. I saw their performance last year and it was amazing! They did a fight scene from Othello and just loved working with Bob and performing in front of an audience for the first time.
Michael Forden Walker (our Cassio) will be making school visits to schools who will be attending the Othello matinees. They'll do work on the play before the students see it so they'll have a deeper understanding of the text right from the get go.
Outside of the Othello text itself, Jennie Israel and Project Director Lori Taylor will be at the Pelletier Assessment Facility and Rotenberg Treatment Facility 2 days a week through the end of March; Magda Spasiano is working on Midsummer with our Shakespeare on the Outs girls two days a week as part of an after school program. (Check out the SoS page on Facebook!); Magda and Jason are also working with student at Boston Arts Academy on Midsummer. Some of the actors that performed in our Midsummer (which closed in January) are performing in this production as well! I went to one rehearsal and you should see Jason direct these kids! They think he's just the bees knees (but they would never use such an old fashioned word to describe it!). And last but not least, Lori Shaller and Mara Sidmore (our Hermia in Midsummer) will be leading a teacher training at Charlestown High School for 12 English teachers in March.
Check back in soon for reports on how all of these projects are going!
Adele

A story's power

I’m eager to see what happens tonight at the first full rehearsal. Tuesday night's read-thru was so alive – Judy, the director, invited the actors to move physically whenever they felt like it – and the play kept catching fire, giving us glimpses of its glory and power. I thought, if just the read-thru is making me feel so much, this production is going to be amazing!

Before the read-thru, Judy spoke about her vision of the play and the setting of this production in the very near future (2015). The designers showed everyone the work they’d been doing over the past months – Tijana’s gorgeous and elegant set model with a gold runway-floor and gold wires, Nancy’s sleek and sexy costumes that pick up the gold of the set and Villa Victoria’s gold-and-purple interior, and GW’s eerie musical themes for Iago and Desdemona. Rob, the violence designer, gave an exciting demo of the modern weapons the actors will be using. Judy told us the action is going to swirl all through the Villa Victoria space, the floor, the balconies, the stairs.

The read-thru gave me such a visceral sense of all these people in the play who are so enclosed inside the bubble of their own stories, and who feel compelled to play their story out. Othello is (among other things) about how powerful a story can be. Othello wins Desdemona with a story. (“My story being done,/ She gave me for my pains a world of kisses . . .”). Iago destroys Othello with a story – a fiction about Desdemona. The characters’ stories about themselves and others, their own belief-systems or world views, are shockingly powerful – WE can see the story might be just a bubble, paper-thin or thinner, that you could put your fist through – but for them, it’s completely impenetrable. They are unable to break through to one another. And I thought, is this what tragedy is? or is this what makes tragedy possible?

Joyce Van Dyke

Dramaturg

Let the games begin!

And they have begun! We had our first rehearsal last night for Othello. It was an amazing, productive and magical. Every person in the room was excited to be working on this project.

This is just the beginning of the journey and a journey it will be indeed! Several members of the cast, crew & staff will be updating the blog throughout the rehearsal process. We look forward to joining us along the way.

Cheers!
Laura Sullivan
Director of Marketing