Session Six: Week 28

Tuesday

Written by Frannie

As has happened every year, we’ve recently lost a few ensemble members due to excessive absences. We began tonight by figuring out how to plug those casting holes.

When I discussed the possibility that we might have to do this with a small group last week, one woman who frequently talks about her lack of confidence and fear of performing mentioned that she might want to play Clarence, one of the vacated roles. I said that I was excited to hear that, that we would make our decisions as a group, and to keep thinking it over. Moments later, a woman who hadn’t heard that exchange mentioned to me that she was interested in playing Clarence – she’s been looking for more roles to take on for a while, and I have encouraged her to jump in when there was an opportunity. I thanked her for doing exactly what we talked about and mentioned that this other woman was also interested, reminding this woman, too, that our decisions would be made as a group. “Oh,” she said thoughtfully, “That’s really great that she wants to do that.”

Tonight, as we began discussing our casting options, the first thing that second woman said was, “I’d like to play Brakenbury.” We all nodded and wrote that down, thanking her for taking it on. As we did that, the first woman leaned over to me and whispered, “I’d like to play Clarence.” I whispered back, “I think you should say that to the group.” She then announced her intention to the ensemble, and everyone burst into applause, smiling and making sure she knew how proud we are of her, and how happy we are that she is taking on such a challenge. It is a very big step.

We then dove back into the ghost scene. Three ensemble members had edited the scene down to “the meat” – eliminating all lines that seemed non-essential. Another woman had drawn diagrams of her blocking ideas. We spent the next hour putting all of this together, including new ideas that were sparked by the discussion, and finding ways of honoring many individual ideas in our final concept. In our version of this scene:

•    Richard and Richmond are sleeping, one on either side of the stage.
•    Buckingham enters, holding a mask over his face that is white with a red X over the mouth (to reflect the voices of the ghosts that have been silenced), and says, “Let me sit heavy on thy soul tomorrow.”
•    Ten more ghosts enter from various parts of the theatre, whispering, “Despair and die.” They also carry masks.
•    The ghosts circle around Richard, saying lines that we’ve culled from the text. They then move to circle around Richmond in a “figure eight” pattern, say some lines to him, and, as they exit, Buckingham delivers his final lines.

We were pretty satisfied with this idea, but then one woman wondered aloud if having only one conceptual scene like this in the play would be strange and out of place. She had a good point. I asked the group if there were other opportunities in the play to bring in the masks. The ideas started flowing, and what we ended up with is that we will introduce the masks in our yet-to-be-written prologue, making it clear that the masks symbolize death, and then whenever someone in the play is about to exit to his or her death, ghosts carrying masks will enter, give that person a mask, and escort him or her off.

It was an exciting evening, to be sure. I was tasked with taking all of these ideas and coalescing them into a written scene. The goal is for me to write it over the next week, and for us to stage it next Tuesday.

Friday

Written by Kyle

Tonight started off on the slower side as there was a small turnout at the outset, with our Richard and Richmond both absent at the start.  We decided that we would start in Act 5, with Buckingham’s monologue just before he is killed.  This monologue is easily one of my favorites in this play, and, I dare say, one of my favorites in the canon.  It is a profound moment when the Duke of Buckingham, who has been Richard’s right hand man and chief co-conspirator, is betrayed by Richard and suffers the same fate he has been so quick to inflict on others.  There is a solemn moment before he is executed when he simultaneously muses on how the tables have turned and subtly takes responsibility for his actions.  It’s contemplative, yet sobering, and the Bard at his best.  It takes on a different dynamic in the context of the prison; it deals so explicitly with committing a crime and accepting the consequences, I almost felt nervous giving her notes and coaching her through it.  Principally, the actor and I had to tease out an objective, which meant we had to nail down whom she is addressing.  We tried it different ways, each with its own implications: If she is talking to the jailor on stage with her, what does that mean? If she is talking to herself, what does that mean? If she is talking to God, what does that mean?  If she is talking to the ghosts of those she murdered, what does that mean?  It seems a little tedious but I found the conversation to be really incredible.  For whatever reason it was not much of a group activity, and to be honest I feel badly that I didn’t try to include the group more.

After working that scene, we moved backwards to Act 4, scene 4, with Margaret, Elizabeth, and the Duchess.  This is another fascinating scene, in which the play’s major women find common ground in their hate for Richard. The houses of Lancaster and York have done unspeakable deeds to one another, but history doesn’t seem to matter in light of the present terror Richard has inflicted on both.  It’s a somber scene, and the characters have a lot of negative things to say to one another; line for line there are much more of those than of reconciliation, so it was difficult at times to even imagine bringing it to the forefront.  

There was a pretty significant disagreement between the actor playing Elizabeth and the actor playing Margaret about just how the scene should go.  ‘Elizabeth’ thought there should be more reconciliation sooner, and ‘Margaret’ didn’t think there should be any at all. I felt like there was a push from the actors for me to give them direction and be the tiebreaker, but I couldn’t.  That seems to be a real sticking point with a lot of the ensemble this year: collaboration takes time.  Democracy is more rewarding, but infinitely more cumbersome than a dictatorship. To their credit, most professional rehearsal rooms are run like a dictatorship; no matter how giving or collaborative a director can be, at the end of the day they have the option to pull rank on the actors.  It’s my experience that good directors pull rank sparingly, but lead the cast when necessary.  It’s quick and clean, but not one of the core values of Shakespeare in Prison; we have a commitment to collaboration, and it may not be timely, but ultimately it is what is most rewarding.  We spent the rest of the session on this one scene, which is only a few pages long.  One ensemble member even got frustrated with us at one point, saying that the performance was looming and we didn’t have time for this kind of debate.  I disagreed, and urged the actors to keep muddling through. In the end, we found a way in which everyone felt content with the scene.  Collaboration is not always easy, and not always timely, but it achieves the program’s aims such that real changes begin to take hold in our participants.  With Act 4, scene 4, it was definitely worth the wait.  The actors were able to show so much range, and such a clear journey from start to finish that is has become one of the scenes I really look forward to seeing in production. 

Session Six: Week 27

Tuesday

Tonight was all about cuts to the script. We began with the goal of staging Act One, scene three, but after reading through it once, we realized that a lot of it had to go. We made a series of cuts – some of them pretty dramatic – and then read it again. And then we realized that we wanted MORE cuts!

In the course of this process, we eliminated all of Dorset’s and Grey’s lines. The women playing those roles quietly voiced some resentment (they have so few lines to begin with) but rolled with the punches – they prioritize the ensemble pretty consistently. I mulled over this to myself and realized that Rivers still had a bunch of lines in the scene – and she (who is also playing Tyrrel) has been overwhelmed by the thought of memorizing as many lines as she has. I quietly asked her if she’d like to give some of her lines in this scene to Dorset and Grey. She liked that idea, so I asked the three of them to huddle and figure out how to distribute the lines.

After they had done so and shared with me, one of them prodded our Rivers/Tyrrel to tell me about a concern that she had. Tyrrel has a bit of a soliloquy, and the language is fairly complex, both of which were worrying her. We put our heads together and figured out how to cut nearly all of the speech. She was quite relieved!

At that point, we were so in the mode of making cuts that our Richard and Richmond both asked Matt and me to collaborate with them on honing down some of their monologues. It was a great exchange between the four of us – slowly going through those passages to figure out how much we could or should cut. We were able to make some significant changes.

I was concerned that not everyone in the ensemble was involved in the cutting process tonight, but when I conferred with the other facilitators (who hadn’t had their heads buried in a script for two hours), they told me that the others were either engaged in meaningful, reflective conversations or working on their scripts themselves. It was good to know that it had been overall a good, productive night for everyone.

Friday

We had low attendance tonight, which happens sometimes, and we decided to make the best of it by huddling around a table and working to adapt the scene in which the ghosts of Richard’s victims visit him and Richmond.

We have known that we would need to make adjustments to this scene, but we weren’t sure exactly how to do it. We began by reading through the scene to get a feel for the original writing and see what ideas came to us immediately. Aspects of the scene that stuck out to people included the brutality of some of the lines, the effectiveness of certain characters speaking in unison, and the number of ghosts in the scene. We determined that our goals would be to shorten the scene but preserve its intention and impact.

The group was a little stuck in the mode of simply cutting lines, but that kept presenting challenges that could only be overcome by altering the scene in a pretty radical way. I asked the group to go through it and identify key words and phrases that stuck out to them, beginning with the lines directed at Richard and then moving to the ones given to Richmond. We noted that the “Richard words” that struck us were dark, violent, and accusatory; the “Richmond words” were uplifting and encouraging. The core phrases we identified were “despair and die” (Richard) and “live and flourish” (Richmond). We also determined that Buckingham’s closing couplets are so powerful that we wanted to keep them to “drop the mic” on the scene.

I then asked the group why the scene is so repetitive – why did Shakespeare write it that way? There were several ideas about this that built on one another – that the device emphasizes the difference between the characters and that it drives home two points: 1) that what you do comes back to haunt you; there are always consequences, and 2) that Richard has a LOT of victims – not just one, but many lives. “This is one of the biggest parts of the whole play,” said one woman. “Yeah,” agreed another woman. “It’s like, you know how many people he’s killed, but this puts in in your face. We need to keep them all in. We need the magnitude.”

I asked the group why, in addition to the repetition, Shakespeare wrote the ghosts going back and forth between the two men. The group had several ideas about this: that it shows battles within and without; that it shows a shift in power from Richard to Richmond; that it makes the dichotomy between good and evil more dramatic.

So, I asked, what are the effects of the scene on each of the men? Richard is startled awake and has an incredible monologue in which he expresses doubt, fear, guilt, anxiety, and a feeling that he’s lost control. It’s his most human moment in the play. Richmond, on the other hand, feels encouraged, empowered, and energized (insert jokes here about how nearly every word we came up with began with “e”).

Then came the next phase – how did we want to stage this? One woman shared visions of the ghosts wearing tunics with images of how they were killed. We built on that by wondering if they could carry signs. Another woman said she pictured the ghosts wearing white makeup with black circles around their eyes. I pointed out that, while that would be visually very effective, it would be logistically very challenging. I asked if masks might achieve the same effect, and the group felt that that might work. Someone suggested bringing in a smoke machine, which I assumed wouldn’t be allowed and would be very complicated to use even if it were, and someone else suggested using fabric to simulate smoke. Another woman suggested that the ghosts wear “flowy ghost capes.”

Riffing on the phrases “despair and die” and “live and flourish,” we started to wonder if there was a way to stage this as a sort of protest. “Hashtag Ghost Lives Matter,” joked one woman. We started throwing ideas around. We all agreed that the ghosts should enter from all parts of the theatre, and we wondered if they should immediately speak or be silent at first. “This is people who’ve been silenced regaining their voices,” said one woman.

We thought of different types of movement. Should the ghosts move in a crowd? In a figure eight around the men? Should they stand in a line? Flip their signs or hold them steady? Or get rid of the signs altogether?

We struggled with how to put the words and phrases together but all agreed that Buckingham should end the scene. We also wondered how our adapted script would spur Richard’s monologue.

At that point, we realized we were out of time – the night went by very quickly! A few of us decided to keep brainstorming and write down our ideas to bring to the group on Tuesday, when we hope we can hash things out and finalize them.

It was a very exciting, engaging evening, and definitely an unusual one for us. We don’t often do collaborative writing like this – our interpretations are usually pretty straightforward. I’m excited to see where tonight’s brainstorm leads. We have so many good ideas!

Session Six: Week 26

Tuesday

Tonight’s check-in was fairly extended – pretty much everyone in the group was having a rough time and needed to share. Although what we were talking about was pretty dark, there was still humor sprinkled in, along with a great amount of support for one another.

A longtime ensemble member, who is an accurately self-described workhorse, came in during this check-in, realized what we were talking about, and promptly left. This caused me some concern, and when a friend of this ensemble member expressed that she was also concerned, I told her that the ensemble member has, over the years, frequently expressed that she would rather work on Shakespeare than talk about feelings, and that that is probably what caused her to leave. “But this is about so much more than Shakespeare,” she said. Another ensemble member nodded vigorously, saying, “Sometimes the check-ins need to be long. Today we needed to talk.” I agreed that this is an important aspect of what we do. The first inmate said, “We need that honesty, trust, accountability and team work… It makes it feel so good to be here. Not to mention the Shakespeare. I can’t tell you how much I love Shakespeare. It’s so accurate to our experience here – he uses the perfect words. I’m so glad I found this.”

We then decided to work on Act Four, scene two. There was some debate about whether we needed a coronation scene – since the goal is to perform this in 90 minutes or less, we don’t have much time for things like this. We eventually figured out an efficient, symbolic way to make it happen.

In this scene, Richard asks Buckingham to kill the princes. When Buckingham says he needs some time to think about it, Richard turns to a killer for hire, and then makes it very clear to Buckingham that he is out of favor. Buckingham decides to flee while he can.

We asked ourselves if Buckingham knows what Richard is asking from the get-go – is he deflecting, or does he honestly not know what he’s getting at? We leaned toward deflection, and we talked about the distance that immediately grows between the men, who have been so close throughout the play up until this point. I offered that the scene might largely be about the breakdown of that friendship. This was reflected in the women’s initial staging instincts – at first they drifted apart, and then Richard swooped back in to threaten Buckingham.

There was some confusion about the latter part of the scene – Stanley enters, has a brief exchange with Richard, and then stays on stage, saying nothing. We debated whether or not Richard brings him deeper into the conspiracy. We decided that if that happened it would give Stanley more impetus to go against Richard in the end, so we staged it that way – although we decided that Stanley should have some physical distance during Richard’s exchange with Tyrrel.

The woman playing Stanley was at first disappointed that many of her lines had been cut for time, but now she seems to be more enthusiastic about the role. She is certainly taking ownership of it. I’m really happy to see that.

Friday

Tonight we dove into Act Three, scene two, as our Hastings, who has frequently been absent due to work, was eager to get up on her feet. In this scene, Hastings is given a message by Stanley, who then enters the scene, about a dream he had about Richard. Hastings laughs off the danger. Some of our ensemble members found the scene a little obtuse, so we spent some time clarifying the content.

We had a bit of a debate about how entrances to the scene should work, and the scene’s Messenger, who also plays Dorset, spoke up again very strongly. This seems to be built upon the group’s positive reception to her voicing her ideas last week about Dorset – prior to that evening, she had been very quiet. It’s exciting to see her taking more of a stand now.

I have also noticed recently that one of our ensemble members, who nearly flaked toward the end of last season (we had legitimate concerns that she might not show up for our performances), has taken on more of a leadership role this year, becoming one of the ensemble’s most vocal cheerleaders and taking it upon herself to gently and kindly guide new ensemble members through unfamiliar territory. Tonight in particular, she helped a new ensemble member to understand the best way in which to do a cross and the reasons behind stepping downstage of another actor as opposed to upstage. It’s really, really great when that kind of advice comes from an ensemble member rather than a facilitator.

On Fridays, we are usually in a classroom rather than the auditorium, and this can lead to some confusion about our exact blocking. One instance was a brief argument over whether one person stepping backward would land her on the stairs leading to the stage, or if she would have room on the floor to make the move. We generally table these details until we get back in the auditorium. Despite the misunderstandings, things never got heated, and we laughed a lot as we tried to figure out what everyone was talking about.

The woman who is playing the Prince is extremely nervous about the amount of lines she has – she has fairly low confidence and giggled her way nervously through two minor roles in Othello last year. She had expressed a desire to cut the scene with Richard down as much as possible. After checking with the others in the scene, I asked another ensemble member, who is very good at cutting, to take a look at the scene and see what she could do to whittle it down.

Some of the women are already working on memorizing their lines. This is extremely early in the process for this to happen – in fact, I can’t remember it happening in years past. We applauded those women’s efforts and reminded them not to put too much pressure on – we still have three months until we perform. Several of the women have also been working lines and exploring scenes in their units, which, again, shows a lot of dedication that encourages others in the group to follow suit.

Session Six: Week 25

Chuk Nowak returned to the prison tonight to finish filming for a video project we’re putting together tonight some of our process and its effects. Several of the women in the ensemble were interviewed individually for this, sharing some really amazing insight, and then Chuk filmed the remainder of our rehearsal.

We decided to keep moving forward in the play (we’re on a roll!) and work on Act Four, scene one, in which Brakenbury tells Elizabeth that she can’t see her children, Stanley tells Anne she is about to be crowned queen, Elizabeth has a breakdown, and a plan is made for Dorset to flee. It’s quite a scene!

The group collaborated well on blocking in the first part of the scene, working to figure out the best positions for all of the actors and where people should enter and exit. There was some great problem solving. When Brakenbury told Elizabeth that she couldn’t see her children, that actress instinctively swooped in on her, and Anne and the Duchess followed. It was a really effective moment.

We talked a bit about Brakenbury’s slip – when he refers to Richard as the king, even though at this point he is still the Lord Protector. I asked the group what they thought it meant. Everyone was unanimous that this indicates that everyone can see through what Richard is doing.

One woman then suggested that, when the women move in on Brakenbury, Dorset should advance as well. The woman playing Dorset was hesitant to do so, but at first she didn’t speak up about why. This led to some discussion amongst the other members of the group about how Dorset feels upon hearing the news about the children being kept from their mother. Finally, I asked our Dorset how she felt. “I don’t think he would move in,” she said firmly. I asked her why not. “I think it’s self-preservation. I think he sees red flags,” she said. That interpretation was accepted with no further discussion – she had made a good point.

We talked, too, about Stanley’s role in this scene. Unfortunately, the woman playing Stanley wasn’t present, so we didn’t get too deep into it, but we all thought that it seems like Stanley is conflicted in this scene – delivering the message and then offering to help Dorset get away. There is clear conflict here, and we want to talk about it more with the woman who is playing the role.

We started having blocking problems again at this point, and it was here that I decided to step in, since the solution was rooted in details of the text that we haven’t talked about too much yet this year. Elizabeth’s lines upon hearing that Richard is being crowned are:

Ah, cut my lace asunder
That my pent heart may have some scope to beat,
Or else I swoon with this dead-killing news.

We all know why she’s upset here, but we were missing just how deep this goes. I pointed out, first, that when Shakespeare’s characters say “Ah” or “O,” it often isn’t meant to be those literal vowel sounds, but rather emotional exclamations – often raw. So that was our first clue about what needs to happen – that it needs to be raw and emotional. The second thing I pointed out was that that first line is short, and the rhythm is irregular, especially compared to the vast majority of this play, which is pretty faithfully written in iambic pentameter. I asked the group what they thought the significance of that was. After some rumination, we arrived at this irregularity reflecting its being an irregular moment – that it’s jarring, that she’s shocked. And then we parsed out the meaning of the whole phrase – that she is asking someone to cut open the laces of her corset because her heart is beating so hard that she fears she will faint.

Given this new information, I again asked the group what’s going on here. “It’s a collapse,” one person said. “Yes,” I said, “And if the collapse is physical as well, I think we’ve solved our blocking problem.” When our Elizabeth sank down on the edge of the stage, the Duchess and Dorset immediately moved to her, while our Anne hung back, consumed by her own dread. We then found that Anne could move toward Stanley, and then out toward the audience during the monologue in which she realizes that she’s cursed herself. It was then simple for the Duchess to speak to each person individually (something that had really been tripping us up), and the exits revealed themselves naturally.

We spent a lot of time on this very brief scene, but it was warranted. I could tell that our Elizabeth was feeling apprehensive about this emotional collapse, and I assured her that no one expected her to “go there” at this stage of rehearsal, but that she should gear herself up to do it later.

It’s also worth noting that one woman who is usually fairly reticent spoke up frequently tonight, giving really insightful suggestions and feedback on blocking. We encouraged her to keep speaking up – those of us who’ve been doing this for years noted that natural directors emerge every year, and this year it looks like she’s one of them. I hope that she’ll continue to contribute in this way, as she has great instincts, and her success in staging could build confidence that will translate to other areas of her life. It’s happened many times before.

Session Six: Week 24

Tuesday

Tonight we worked on Act Three, scene five, in which Richard and Buckingham manipulate the Lord Mayor into trying to persuade the citizens to hear out the reasons why the princes are illegitimate. A minute or so into the scene, a couple of minor characters enter with Hastings’ head (Richard framed and had him executed in the previous scene).

Initially, the scene felt awkward and wooden, so we worked together to fix it. First off, based on how everyone was standing on stage, it would have been impossible for the Lord Mayor to see the head in a bag (we clearly don’t have the budget to replicate our Hastings’ head, nor do we think the prison would allow us to use a severed head…). We revisited what the scene is about – Richard and Buckingham pushing the Lord Mayor into doing this thing and using the head as part of that manipulation. What we arrived at was having them literally manhandle the Lord Mayor around the stage, getting him very close to the head. And then, in a burst of creativity, our Richard took the bag from the messenger and started gesticulating wildly with it, repeatedly putting it in the Lord Mayor’s face. It was hysterically funny, especially because our Lord Mayor stayed almost completely in character as she reacted to it. We might want to pull it back at some point, but for now we absolutely love it.

We then moved on to the Scrivener’s speech, in which he talks about how, while he was in the midst of transcribing Hastings’ indictment, Hastings was already executed. He questions how people could not see through Richard’s machinations; and, if they did see through it, what it would take for them to speak out. Our Scrivener at first didn’t understand some of the language; I explained it to her, and she said, “Oh, okay. So this is exactly the way I feel about politics right now.”

I asked the group why this speech is in the play. We talked about what a scary situation this must be for the “little people,” who would be able to observe events without being able to directly affect them, and who might be drafted into war against their wills. We decided that the main thrust of the speech is to try to get someone to speak up. The second time our Scrivener delivered the speech, all of her intentions were crystal clear. It hit home for many of us.

Friday

Before we began tonight, one of our ensemble members pulled me aside to speak to me about her good friend in the group. This friend is extremely nervous about getting up on stage. She also has OCD and is terrified of being touched. I reminded the ensemble member that, first of all, nobody has to do anything that she doesn’t want to do, and that, given the characters she’s playing, there is no need for physical contact. I encouraged her to ask her friend to talk to me herself. But I also suggested that we push her friend just a bit – that we ask her to at least try getting up on stage before she decides that she can’t do it. “Now’s the time,” I said. “We’re still a ways away from performing, so there’s no pressure and no audience.” She said, “That’s exactly what I told her!” We’ll see how it goes.

I had one-on-one conversations with a couple of other ensemble members as well. One is nearing her release date and is very concerned about what’s going to happen when she goes home. Her relationship with her family is complicated, and she has big goals for herself that will be challenging to achieve. I listened attentively and encouraged her not to put too much pressure on herself – that she is certainly going to have challenges, but that doesn’t necessarily mean she will fail. Another ensemble member simply wanted me to know that this is a rough time of year for her, and that’s why she’s been a bit reticent lately. I thanked her for continuing to show up when she’s having such a hard time.

Some ensemble members requested that we do our Six Directions exercise, and this time I challenged the people participating to do it without speaking. We stayed perfectly in sync.

We chose to work on Act Three, scene seven, in which Buckingham and Richard continue their manipulation to make Richard king. A running theme in the play is Richard’s religious hypocrisy, and nowhere is it more evident than in this scene. Our Richard took this to heart, repeatedly dropping to her knees and praying, laying it on thick as she resisted Buckingham’s pleas to take the crown. It was hilarious. She really understands the humor in this role (which is often missed), and she is so much fun to watch.

The other thing that was really remarkable was when we asked who would play the aldermen (who don’t speak) in this scene. The woman who, months ago, told us that her anxiety might prevent her from getting on stage at all, volunteered to play one of the roles. No one had pushed her (we all agreed not to when she originally expressed the concern) – she just decided to do this of her own accord. These kinds of moments are my favorite part of this program – when someone who initially thought she couldn’t do something decides to give it a go. It shows so much growth and courage.