Session Six: Week 32

Tuesday

Before we began tonight, I checked in the woman who, at this point, has been in the group longer than anyone but me. I had some questions for her about ways in which the group has changed operationally over the last few years, and she provided a lot of insight, as she always does. She was very firm about the positive impact that the program has had on her, saying, “It’s given me humanity,” and that, as she is going home soon, she is already grieving its loss. She said that prison hasn’t been an entirely negative experience for her – “Certainly not the worst time in my life,” she said. She feels that she created the chaos that led her here, and she is confident that, because of the skills she’s learned in prison (including in Shakespeare), she will not be coming back.

We held the second focus group of our case study, which took about an hour. I can’t share the details of that conversation at this point, but rest assured that the study will be posted on our website as soon as it’s ready!

The ensemble then broke off into several groups – some women worked on their lines, others staged a scene with Kyle, and I worked with our Richard and Anne to finish cutting their big scene and make sure we were all on the same page with content. We are!

Our Richard then stepped away to join the scene happening on stage, and I continued to work with our Anne. She has already memorized her monologue and part of the scene. She is extremely excited – her having memorized the monologue already is evidence of how hard she’s already pushing herself, even though she’s very afraid of performing. We went through the monologue to make sure she understood at which points she’s talking to whom, as well as some ideas about the text and possible interpretations.

Our plan to ease her into this is for the two of us to work together, separate from the rest of the group, until she feels solid on the piece. At that point, she’ll begin working on it with the ensemble, so we hope she’ll have had plenty of rehearsal in a safe space before performance. This is way, way out of her comfort zone, but she is determined to do it – and to do it well.

Friday

Our new Hastings came in tonight asking if we thought we could cut back any of the scene in which the character ignores Stanley’s warning about Richard and is oblivious to Catesby’s “sounding him.” We realized that we really could only cut about two more lines – we’ve already eliminated about half of the scene. It turned out that this woman was mostly worried about a short monologue that she has. A woman who joined the group last year said, “Oh, the monologues are way easier than all the little lines.” She talked about building a train of thought, and how, even though it seems daunting, it’s totally doable.

We then decided to work on that scene. We asked “little” questions, such as: How does Hastings feel about Stanley’s messenger waking him up at 4:00 a.m.? We explored other issues, such as how Catesby feels about Hastings and where the allegiances are. Our Catesby realized that the moment when she realizes that Hastings has sealed his own fate is extremely complicated. This woman hasn’t had a lot of stage time yet – she has a dance class at the same time, and she divides her time between the two – and she lit up more and more as we continued to work.

We worked through to the end of the scene, exploring more questions about Catesby and Stanley. “I wish I knew more about Stanley,” said the woman playing the character. I looked at our “dramaturg.” “You on that?” I asked. She nodded, smiling – she hasn’t gotten to do research in a while, and she loves to do it. She mentioned that the prison library just acquired a big, new Shakespeare dictionary, and there was a lot of excitement in response. It’s really going to aid their work, particularly during the summer when the program is in recess and they’re on their own.

As we continued to explore the scene, I asked our Hastings what the stakes are – does he realize how serious the situation is? She said she didn’t think so, and then she paused. “He’s like me,” she said. “I’m growing out of the character, but I used to shoot my mouth off at the wrong time. I feel like it really is me. I’m smart, but I’m absent-minded. So is he. Smart, but not paying attention. Look what I’ve been through in the past few months. I think this person’s my friend, but she’s over here talking… It’s like in the movie [Shakespeare Behind Bars] – when the part chooses you. It’s God making sure I don’t go back to this when I get out.” We thanked her for sharing that with us – that level of identification doesn’t always happen, but when it does, it’s something we all honor.

We started to get a little sidetracked, at which point a woman who has frequently emerged as a leader in the group, got our attention and suggested the next scene to work on - the scene in which Ratcliffe, a number of messengers, and then Stanley arrive very quickly to give Richard news of the impending war. We talked about why the scene is structured the way it is – to give a feeling of chaos – and worked together to figure out how to stage it. Once again, our Ratcliffe took the lead – she is becoming increasingly confident in her staging skills – and it worked out very well! We had a lot of fun working with Richard’s reaction to all of the news and the stage slap that is a part of that. Our Richard is working with the image of being stuck in a pinball machine, which seems to be working well for her.

We worked a little more and then circled up for our ending exercise. I suggested that, from now on, we spend every moment we can working – what we have to do is not impossible, but it’s going to take a lot of discipline. The facilitators often do not arrive right at the beginning of our meeting time, but usually when we do arrive, members of the ensemble are trickling in. I suggested working in small groups on lines and staging – everyone in the ensemble knows the play well enough at this point to do both. It can be challenging to be the person to initiate this, but I encouraged them to try.

Session Six: Week 31

Tuesday

Tonight we were thrilled to welcome Patrick Hanley for a visit. Patrick is a stage combat choreographer, and he volunteered to choreograph the big showdown between Richard and Richmond. Everyone got a taste of fencing and had a great time. The ensemble decided that this fight should be solely between Richard and Richmond – they felt that any other fighting would be distracting. So while the three of them worked, the rest of us huddled up to resolve some casting issues.

A longtime ensemble member who had been playing Anne has left the group. I asked everyone what we should do about casting the role, thinking it was likely that, having settled into the roles they have, no one would want to take on another with so many lines. It turned out that I was wrong! All I had to do was ask, “Any thoughts on how to cast this?” And without missing a beat, our “extremely anxious” ensemble member – who, remember, just a few months ago said she could never perform, and recently took on a small role – said, “I’ll do it.”

“Really?” a bunch of us said simultaneously. “Yeah,” she said. “I’ve liked Anne since the beginning. I already was reading her with [another ensemble member]. I’d like to play her. I think I can do it.” We all applauded her – this is so exciting! She decided to play the First Murderer as well, at least for now. Another woman volunteered to take on that role if two become too overwhelming.

This is tremendous growth. It’s encouraging not just for the woman making these moves, but for everyone else as well. When we see someone else taking risks like this, it makes it easier for the rest of us.

We distributed the remaining minor roles as well. There was a lot of generosity there, with many people volunteering, compromising, and distributing lines.

With the remaining time, we talked about past plays and audience reactions, both to our successes and mistakes. It was a fun conversation and seemed to alleviate some of the pressure that newer members are feeling – totally normal for this time in the season.

The fight between Richard and Richmond is stellar. We are all very excited about it! Many thanks to Patrick for his work this week.

Friday

We were thrilled to welcome an ensemble member back to the group whom we thought we wouldn’t be seeing again. The woman who had taken on First Murderer immediately offered the role back to the returning member, who happily took it. She also decided to play Hastings after we lost the woman playing that role.

We spent some time working on Edward’s monologue. The woman playing Edward has an astounding grasp of the language, and she is very powerful on stage. The only issue with her performance is that she’s taking a lot of pauses where there is no punctuation, which is slowing her down and obscuring the meaning. We encouraged her to drive through to each punctuation, and to use her words to really lash out at the other people on stage. This helped somewhat, but she then confided in me that she has an issue with her vision that is the true source of all of the pausing – she simply has trouble reading the words. She is going to focus on memorizing the speech so we can see what her pacing is actually like.

We then moved on to the scene in which Elizabeth and Richard have some back and forth, and then Margaret comes in and curses everyone. This was a lot of fun. We explored different ways of distributing people around the stage, finding movement for the principal characters, and making sure that Margaret’s curses really land. We’ve got some refining to do, but it’s well on the way.

We have just a little more cutting to do to the script, and then, thanks to a generously donated binding machine, I’ll be printing new copies for everyone. We’ve been doing so much crossing out – the “clean” scripts will be most welcome!

Session Six: Week 30

Tuesday

I was out of town during our last meeting, and I used some of my time to put together a list of potential cuts to the script. I have sensed the group wanting to move forward more quickly with staging, and growing frustration with the cutting process. They verified this when I asked them if my instinct was correct. I made sure to note to everyone that this was a list of suggestions, and that any/all of them could be rejected.

We ended up sitting in a circle on the floor going through the cuts, which gave us a feeling of camaraderie and the impetus for a lot of jokes – even more so than usual. I hadn’t really wanted to spend an entire evening making cuts, but it turned out to be pretty fun.

As we got to the scene in which the Murderers banter and then kill Clarence, the question arose of who would play the First Murderer now that the previously cast woman has had to leave the group. To our complete surprise, the woman who had told us in the fall that her extreme anxiety would likely prevent her from performing at all, and who about a month ago volunteered to play only a small non-speaking role, casually said, “I’ll play the First Murderer.” There was silence for a moment. “You will?” someone said. “Yeah,” she said, smiling a little. The group burst into applause and cheers. She looked down, still smiling, saying, “Don’t make a big deal about it, you guys.” We tried to contain our excitement, but this is absolutely huge. Not only is she going to get up on stage, and not only will she speak, but she has a good number of lines! I am so excited to see what this experience does for her.

Friday

As we checked in tonight, one of the women said she had something to share. She paused. “You know, I forgot it’s not safe outside of Shakespeare,” she said, telling us about something she said in confidence in her unit that was told to others and blown out of proportion. She is now living in an intensely uncomfortable situation, not knowing exactly how this got out, and not knowing exactly how to deal with it. She’s decided to try to hunker down until it blows over. “I’m just so glad I can come and talk here, and it doesn’t get out,” she said. “This is the one safe place I have here.”

As noted many times throughout this blog, one of the most valuable aspects of our program is that it creates a safe space in a place that otherwise feels unsafe – emotionally, physically, or both. It’s essential to our work that people be able to express themselves freely and feel supported in being their authentic selves. That’s the culture we’ve built over the years, and it’s overwhelmingly respected by participants.

We continued making cuts to our script now that our Duchess was present – our policy is not to make cuts that affect people who are absent, and she wasn’t there on Tuesday. We got through most of what we had left and then decided to work the Clarence/Brakenbury scene since we have new people in both of those roles.

I huddled with those women before we began the scene to make sure we were all on the same page with content and cuts. The woman playing Clarence nervously said that this would be her first time on stage. I encouraged her, for this first time, not to rush, but to avoid stopping to apologize for any mistakes and just plow through to the end. “Then the first time will be over, and you’ll never have to do it for the first time again,” I said. She smiled. The other woman agreed not to stop the scene. I then approached the group and let them know what the plan was, and they also agreed not to interrupt.

Although visibly nervous, the women got through the scene. Afterward, I let the group know that it had been our Clarence’s first time ever on stage, and we gave her a huge round of applause and lots of encouragement. I asked her how she felt. “I felt like I stumbled a lot,” she said. Others in the ensemble reminded her that everyone stumbles at first with Shakespeare. “You’re gonna be your own worst critic,” said one seasoned ensemble member.

Our Clarence, true to her emerging role as one of the group’s natural directors, then expressed dissatisfaction with the way they’d physically staged the scene and suggested some changes. We talked about the relationship between the two men – does Brakenbury know why Clarence is in prison? Does he have empathy for him, and, if so, how much does he express it?

They tried the scene a second time. “It got better,” one woman said enthusiastically. “It did. This time I felt more emotion from you.” Our Clarence said, “I sort of felt like I should kneel for the prayer.” Our Brakenbury then asked how she should respond to that. I encouraged them to follow their instincts in the moment – not to prejudge anything, but to spontaneously respond to each other, within the play’s parameters, and see where it led them. I pointed out that our Clarence had, at one point, reached out and touched our Brakenbury’s arm for emphasis on her line, “Ah, keeper, keeper…” She had instinctively responded to one of Shakespeare’s open vowels, which indicate emotion, and the repetition of a word.  No one needed to tell her to do that.

The third time through, they adjusted so that our Clarence didn’t sit on the bench, and then she knelt for her prayer. She said she felt better this third time, although she still wants to make adjustments. The growth in her confidence over just three attempts at the scene was remarkable. It is truly inspiring to see someone taking risks like that, and then to see those risks paying off.

Session Six: Week 29

Tuesday

Written by Frannie

We spent tonight collaborating to stage the ghost scene that I had written up from all of our ideas. I was engaged in a one-on-one conversation with an ensemble member during the initial discussion of how to put the scene on its feet, and as I returned to the group and heard the whispered, “Despair and die,” repeated again and again, I felt the energy in the room shift. Everyone was focused. The lines we’d honed in on came out one by one, and the choices we’d made seemed to really work. Physical positioning and movement was rough, but that was to be expected our first time through.

Afterward, I asked the group what they thought. Everyone was enthusiastic – it worked almost exactly as we had envisioned it. Our Richmond said, “Even with my eyes closed… Your voices really creeped me out. Like, I’m kind of having anxiety right now.” She laughed – she was okay, but we talked about the need to really differentiate the energy between Richard and Richmond. So we were glad that she spoke up!

We worked together to refine the movement in the piece, figuring out the best way in which to encircle Richard and then Richmond, as well as the most effective way to move between the two. We looked at Buckingham’s involvement in the scene – he is now essentially leading it, which is very powerful and effective. We then ran through the entire scene and let our Richard continue into her subsequent monologue. The whole thing was positively chilling.

This took nearly all of our time, and it was time well spent. “I loved this process,” said one woman. “It was so much more effective with the lines like that… Even though I didn’t see it staged [because she was on stage]. It transferred. It resonated. It was really intense.”

Friday

Written by Lauren

We got to the room, and it was very warm, which made it difficult to get anyone to start to do anything. Fortunately, after a few minutes, we were told that we could move to a different room that has fans. Everyone was ready to get to work after that!

We started the session with act 4, scene 4 when Richard enters. It was clarified that Elizabeth is Edward's wife. The scene between the two of them is the first time that someone isn't buying what Richard is trying to sell. Our Richard thought that the character should be touching Elizabeth in this scene. Our Elizabeth disagreed. It was discussed that Richard should then change his tactics to convince Elizabeth to listen to him. Our Elizabeth was getting visibly frustrated with our Richard, who was grabbing her arm and not listening to her. They got through the scene, though.

We went on to do a brief analysis on the scene. When asked what Richard wants in this scene, the woman playing him said that he wants Elizabeth to listen to him. When asked what Elizabeth wants in the scene, the woman playing her said that she wants Richard to know how angry she is. We then worked with the "power struggle" that happens between the two on the line "true love's kiss." They both did an amazing and hilarious job with the power struggle!

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.