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Hello my name is Jason Peck and this is

a comedy Q&A; interview with actor author

director and teacher Bill Kincaid. Bill

actually taught my wife Melissa

Shakespeare when she was at college and

he has a really unique approach to the

text.

I will just warn you though that

the audio and the visual can get a

little bit wobbly in this interview so

you’re probably going to want to check

out the transcript.

And if you’re really interested in Bill’s approach to Shakespeare take a look at Bill’s book performing Performing Shakespeare Unrehearsed: A Practical Guide to Acting and Producing Spontaneous Shakespeare.

thanks hello hello yeah this is this is

great getting to I’ve heard a lot about

you over the last however many years

Melissa 10 years Melissa and I’ve been

married now all good things all good

things bill so if you don’t mind I just

like to jump right into it okay so could

you just tell me just a little bit about

your background.

sure so I was a very divided youth

between music and theatre didn’t know

what I wanted to do with a theater major

didn’t get the role I wanted transfer to

a music school discovered that wasn’t

for me went to graduate school in

theater I met some great people in

graduate school who steered me on the

course that I really learned up on as a

freelance director and actor until I

came into academia about 20 you know

here but about 12 years ago I was hired

by the New England Shakespeare Festival

as an actor first exposed to uh-huh

cue scripted techniques Shakespeare

whatever different people want to call

it okay so it was in when you were hired

by the New England Shakespeare that’s

when you just were

the unrehearsed technique right

right got it

and before we before we sort of delve

further into that you’ve directed

actors where they rehearse and they’ve

learned their lines right yeah in fact

I’m in the middle of a production like

that now oh great okay so I obviously

asked that because we just lightly

touched on it you you were involved with

obviously you learn the technique at the

new English Shakespeare and you involved

with a company called the unrehearsed

Shakespeare company which was founded

and run by alumni of Western Illinois

University right right right

you were involved my connection only

through the Alumni I’ve actually never

done a show with them but okay as my

former students yeah and I’m aware of

they’ve got it yeah right and you and so

you taught them this technique could you

tell me and you learned it a new English

Shakespeare could you tell me a little

bit more about the technique and how

that sort of came to be sure there’s a

the election excellent book exploring

the history of people’s relationship to

this kind of original practice and how

what we call unrehearsed Shakespeare

came out of that written by a guy named

Don Weingust the book… it’s

called Acting from Shakespeare’s First Folio

got it and he talks about how

there was a man Richard Flatter (Shakespeare’s Producing Hand: A Study of His Marks of Expression to be Found in the First Folio) a

German who was translating Shakespeare

into German okay and couldn’t account

for things he discovered in the language

there were some patterns emerging that

didn’t make sense to him he was in the

(unintelligible) so he asked some other people

about it and of course I’m turning this

into a little uncomplicated fairy tale

but essentially he asked some native

speakers and they said oh no that’s

that’s the way Shakespeare’s there’s no

particular reason and he wasn’t

satisfied with that answer so he

continued to

probe and started this was about 75 years

ago started evolving some of the ideas

that led us to where we are a really

good example would be the of how the

technique works would be the use of

words this and that. the difference between this

water bottle which I have to be touching

and that (well I can’t put it in frame)

but that water model which is at some

distance from me. But these things

dictate blocking in Shakespeare

especially when you’re not talking about

about a water bottle but a person. I f

you’re speaking of a person and calling

them “this man” you have to be close to

them on stage. If you’re calling them

that man you have to be far away, so

depending on where you are and your

orientation to them when you begin the

line you may be receiving instructions

to create distance or create proximity

based on the specific words in your line.

okay Wow

even though this is a really good

one although it’s more complex is the

relationship between the words Thou and

You. (inaudible) has second person singular and second person plural.
which we essentially use as also

for markers of proximity and distance.

Because Thou tends to be more intimate

you always obey a thou or a thee or a thine by getting very close to the person you’re speaking to invading their personal space. And for if you’re using

the similar forms of You, you create more distance.

Okay. it is I was shaking my head because I you know I’m sure I’m gonna I’m sure gonna get more as we keep going but you know I just sort of reflect back how much easier you know my time with Shakespeare over the years, would have been, you know, when I was in college and when I was in high school you know if they were gone oh do this and this and this and you are you gonna it would have open unlocked so much more okay that’s great.

So to be clear then the there’s no rehearsal at all and essentially you’re not really

rehearsing but it’s all spontaneous during the show.

Right so one of my favorite phrases actually is “unrehearsed doesn’t mean unprepared”. So there’s you can put in tremendous amounts of preparation and the recommendation is in fact that you work with I’m going to be taking a course in this this semester and so I’m right now I’m trying to develop how this works best in a classroom setting but we’ll be having everyone in the class will be assigned as coach or text coach for another person so you work with that person privately they make sure that you were catching on to all the clues that are that are within the text so you work on this alone but then on the day of performance everyone who has prepared shows up together and presents the result of their preparation together.

We do allow, in our particular model, we allow one hour beforehand before the performance or what we refer to as “rehearsed segments”; those are songs, fights, maybe big scene changes where some and you can’t have chaos while everybody’s wondering who brings on the throne… we established that beforehand so we have an hour of rehearse segments in advance.

got it okay and then so you would essentially then you go on when I say you and as a we were an actor you would go and work on your own part so you’re not there suddenly doing a like a cold sight reading right okay and you’re like I don’t know what these words mean. Got it.

So at least you understand your part and you’ve got, am I correct in understanding, you’ve got… your cue like a cue prior to you speaking and then (yes) exactly an outline to who’s speaking next?

You don’t like you know who’s speaking next you only have you have your cue four syllables or so of your cue followed by your entire line. right so you’re gonna listen up. yeah you might just be standing on stage for four minutes waiting for the cue and you have no idea when it’s going to come so it’s a it’s a really exhilarating feeling to know at any moment I could be required to speak so you’re very alert it brings an alertness that the rehearsed productions have a hard time duplicating because you know I find myself frequently telling actors you know your character hasn’t read the end of the scene they don’t know where this is going so they may be constantly trying to break in or considering breaking in but when you know because you’ve seen it on the page the other person has a speech this long before I talk there’s no reason to be on the alert.

Right. Right. People will very often gear up right at the end of that speech. They see it coming and they start get to ready for their line, yeah ain’t that sure right yeah I’m gonna I’m on stage I know you’ve got a page of text so I’m now thinking about my cat what what I’m having for dinner tonight. I’m trying not to drift off but I’m sort of in and out you’re still talking I can drift off again oh no wait now it’s now what now it’s me oh it’s me me me. Right yep and it will just eliminate that.

Yeah, yeah okay and everyone’s present and alive. I love it.

okay I’m sorry if I’m I think as I’m thinking about this and digesting it I’m you know I’m slowing down a little bit so just sort of give you a heads-up as I you know because this is all brand-new for me obviously. So and everyone has their lines with them, right, so just anyone I mean you’re just walking around with multiple scrolls, is that how it works? One scroll…?

Right, one scroll for your character and the way… unfortunately because I am on location now and I didn’t plan ahead well enough, I don’t have one of them with me to show you. No problem. But they are they’re about this big, I guess.

And they’re put together in such a way that you can easily hold them in one hand, and they’re tightly wound, you can just, advance them like a little mini Elizabethan teleprompter. So you can reference it at any time you want, as we’ve already established, right, you’re not really cold reading, so it’s not like you’re in this relationship. Yes it’s there with you, you’ve prepared enough you may only be referencing it periodically. You can tap people with it you can use it as an extension of your hand point… Great for dirty jokes…

All right come on yeah yeah this is really good I’m this is this is great so that

so that and obviously because I I had a question but you’ve sort of answered it in advance you know there is a certain amount of prep and preparation at least with their own you know and acts his own part so then they they’re not going to get confused because they’ve only got the one scroll and they you know they’re not going to be like who’s talking now which scroll am I using that was that was how it was in my imagination, okay, got it.

I actually I want to add to that. There’s certainly doubling. Doubling, right yeah. You’re playing, perhaps, multiple characters. But you would still put those all in one scroll. You would just have a notation to yourself on the scroll.

You know, I’ve been playing, I don’t know, Exeter and now I’m going to reenter as

Richmond. So you run off stage, you have a little note to yourself “I need to

change my hat”. Now I’m Richmond, and I’m back in with my next cue.

And that would work with something like with Midsummer Night’s Dream is often doubled up isn’t it with the… yeah The Fairies and The Court…

Okay, so you were mentioning the book that you mentioned Acting From

Shakespeare’s First Folio and obviously on you know The Unrehearsed Shakespeare Theatre Company uses that as well… why is the why is the First Folio important? Because I know they were other Quartos, the Second Quarto, and so on why is this one important do you think?  

well there’s been a lot of scholarship and scholarly debate over the years certainly not unique to unrehearsed Shakespeare or even original practice, more broadly. about whether the folio is the most important authority and there are people who come down on both sides of that debate.

Certainly if you talk to…. I have friends who are English professors who will for a given textbook so you know know the authoritative text of this play is the Quarto not the Folio, etc.

Unrehearsed, generally considers the Folio to be the

authority that they want to work from

there are there are arguments to be made

on both sides and I even in quite a few

years ago we did a production of Richard

II, where we didn’t use the Folio text we

used the Quarto instead, just to see… with most of the players there are organic… (inaudible)

Eighteen of 640 lines… eighteen of them only exist in the First Folio. So those

obviously you’re only working from one authority. With the others that there for

some debate. The differences are often cosmetic. A matter of punctuation marks

here and there.

But then there are cases are either very different, for example with King Lear vastly different versions. Where some cut and some added in, some scenes happen in a different order so… At some point anyone doing any production of one of those plays, has to make decisions about what they’re going to use and what they’re going to not use.

Are they going into some kind of conflated tune of the two… there becomes some form of editorial intervention on the part of the director. Sometimes because there for… so it’s like choose-your-own-adventure, right, you have to choose one or the other; Folio or Quarto?

Typically although as I said Richard II was an exception typically we’ve always worked with the Folio. Generally speaking those texts are a little more available. You

can get a facsimile… a facsimile of The First Folio. I have one in my office… you can

get a… Hello I can’t even think of the proper term for this… you can get a First Folio that is in contemporary typeset.

There are lots of different ways to get a hold of that text and I think that’s probably a lot of the reason well at least for me why we haven’t experimented more of the Quartos. We’ve stuck to the Folio it’s and then I would stop short of making a really strong argument that the Folio is always right no matter what, but you have to have some system because as soon as you start making excuses for the text you’re working with then you can do anything and that’s not the goal. The goal is to do what’s written, right, that becomes “but what is written?”

but then wouldn’t that preclude you from using some of the plays though, right, I mean it wouldn’t it preclude you from using Two Noble Kinsmen and Pericles…?

I’ve never done either of those there are period versions of those plays that we could do and we would just no we’re not doing you know this is not the First

Folio exist in the first place we’re doing it differently we did this once with I would love to do more experimental stuff with this the problem is its time consuming and resource consuming to do this. So I’ve had fewer opportunities to experiment with non-Shakespearean plays or non Folio plays.

We did Ben Jonson’s Volpone ,a number of years ago just to see you know so what did he apply this to another contemporary play, not written by Shakespeare and I would love to do more of that for fun too deep similarities. (inaudible) that theoretically could operate very much the same way.

right and what just I know this is a isn’t a question that I sent you but it just as I came up what was your (just briefly) what was your findings by doing Ben Jonson’s Volpone using this technique did it, did it bring it alive?

it works one thing that was really different about Johnson that I realized doing it

Shakespeare very very rarely has lines so short that they don’t have four syllables to cue the next person. There are cases King John there’s a little exchange between a couple characters where each one of them only has two or three syllables at a time fora brief period.

But in Volpone it happened several times where someone had a one syllable line or a two syllable line and it really made me question you know okay so what does this mean what’s with the intention in this or did it did Johnson intend for it to work differently because it’s really hard if you’re holding a cue script, it’s one thing to be let’s keep talking about always alert for that during somebody’s long speech it’s another thing to finish your line and have the other person say :of course: and then

you’re supposed to go on those one syllable cues were will be challenging  for the difference otherwise you know basically it’s an Elizabethan play, so you know the things that you learn from one generally speaking apply at least in broad strokes you know yeah right okay interesting.

Now you know your projects you mostly do work in Macomb, Illinois right yeah okay and you do those projects under the name Bard in the Barn is that right did I understand the creek okay could you just tell me a little bit more about those projects, why is why have you called it bard in the barn what is that?

Well now Bard in the Barn because some changes we were working in the city of Macomb originally yeah the city has a sort of talent project right that we could do hoping that we could do something together where the University Theatre could present something to be a town project as well and right at the same time they were looking for new looking for an opportunity to showcase the local historic barns and so in the middle of this conversation where I was saying you know I’d like to do something maybe we could maybe in downtown space I just I really didn’t know exactly what it would be and was hoping it would take some kind of form and  he woman that are speaking to sit at Bard in the Barn. I think she interrupted me even and I said I beg you it’s called it Bard in the Barn. we’re wanting to showcase these

barns so we started doing that.

We did it a couple different historic farms they had a big event that they called “Barnicopia” in the fall to promote the barns and we became a fixture of that so we

would do in a given weekend we would do three different productions two on

Saturday one on Sunday all outside of a with a barn has the back problem we never actually did it in a barn. but we would set the costume racks up inside

the barn and sometimes in what case it was really wonderful we did a big reveal

in Winter’s Tale if you know Winter’s Tale, it was a big reveal of the statue of the

Hermione okay actually by parting the barn doors and the actor was standing

there that became what I referenced before a rehearsed segment. We knew we

wanted to do it like that So we rehearsed that.

right so yeah how it became bard in the barn then there were some number of changes. part it is that we were getting grant money that is no longer available to us right yeah so it’s taken on a different form now. we’re going to be doing some productions in the spring in April right around Shakespeare’s birthday but those are going to be on our campus unfortunately not well it’s great that they’re on our campus but yes unfortunately we blocked the community connection we did have at one point.

okay so and so because of that you’re so those productions are mainly now on campus. right yeah so if I want so if I or someone watching this wants to come and see a show probably wouldn’t be able to do that because it’s on a college campus

23.04

oh no it’s absolutely public they’ll be our University season interesting to you mind my we have time for me to go off on a bit of a tangent

yes you’re… as long as you do so

yeah they’ve given us a slot in our Studio Theatre season a year and it’s always a little difficult with theater folks… actors tend to relate to unrehearsed Shakespeare pretty quickly or at least things with the idea is exciting other theater folks have a

little more trouble processing what we’re trying to do with this. I think especially in in any theater which certainly academia is this way where

there’s a very specific process that you

always follow. you know six weeks in

advance we have to have the technical

drawings– five weeks in advance week

you know all of those things. so my

colleagues have assigned me a scenic

designer a costume designer, etc from

from among the graduate students in the

design program and in are assuming that

we will have a tech week

well you can’t do a traditional tech

week yeah on the show that is not

rehearse right so I was trying to figure

out how to do that because they

feel it’s very important to stick to

that regular schedule and specifically

for the lighting designer

and I did explain you realize the

lighting designer won’t be able to

really what we’re talking about is

general illumination of a space to find

a where and can and cannot happen

because you won’t get to see the show in

advance and you’re really going to

create problems if you try to respond in

the show and create cues given where

people are, I just think that would be

bigger than that, So what we’ve stepped

unprotect week is that Monday Tuesday

Wednesday and Thursday of that week the

entire cast will be present in every

night they’ll do a different play.

so the designers will get to watch, in a sense

they’ll have a tech week, because the

lighting designer can put something up

and see how it functions with us doing

an unrehearsed play but when it comes to

our opening on Friday night we’re going

to do something we’ve never done before

and then Saturday night we’ll do another

show we’ve never done before

right so during the so the week will

actually end up doing six different

plays Wow okay

so yeah that’s now that

we’re moving into a more traditional

theatrical space because outside we were

working with you know natural light and

signs I’ve been talking okay this has to

be a space that can be everything yeah

just have to able to do absolutely

anything now you can decide on maybe a

floor treatment you can decide that

you’re going to give them I don’t know

if you a few options of certain props or

set props what they might choose to use

might choose not to use but we’re not

going to control how these things get

used because that takes away the value

of the experience in the experiment.

right it’s almost like my I’m it’s but

it’s been a little sorry it’s been a

little while so my references may be

off but it’s a little bit like you know

performing at Shakespeare’s Globe versus

wasn’t it Blackfriars Theatre so he moved

indoors later in his career

exactly Yeah right so it’s an adjustment

for the

and then obviously it’s an adjustment

for you know the technical side because

obviously you’d like the Sun is up off

we go right yeah Wow that’s that is

interesting yeah obviously I haven’t

thought about that but yeah of course

you know when you there you know it’s

not just you know the creative side

going hey let’s have fun and let’s not

rehearse this and everyone else is

involved going well what hang on a

minute let’s slow this down.

so what I wanted to ask you was in your experience

a you went on to the Unrehearsed

Shakespeare a website couldn’t find a bard

in the barn website but you’ve obviously

got experienced with some

of Shakespeare’s comedies from both

thee the times where you’ve work with

companies that memorize the lines and

times when you when this that

unrehearsed technique have you noticed a

difference other than the presence

that we spoke about earlier is it have

you noticed a difference in the

directing and has your experience

with the unrehearsed then influenced how

you direct memorized and rehearsed?

Yeah I would say it definitely influenced it

because there are things now that that I

see in the text that I feel are vacation

that’s something that should happen that

I wouldn’t have recognized before I

don’t always adhere to them because I

think but there needs to be a difference

I guess I can use it as an inspiration

yes but it’s not necessarily something

that I adhere to 100%.

and of course the

the essential idea of anything Original

Practice is you’re trying to get as

close as you can to replicating some

kind of original performance right but

that becomes problematic in a lot of

ways for example if you want to sorry

this is going a little bit

far afield, feel free to bring back too far

from the subject yes you have to make

decisions about in Twelfth Night is a

play that has a lots of music in it

Shakespeare’s audience would have been

hearing music that they recognized tunes

that they recognized and that perhaps

that they would sing along with when

they watched that place so now when

you’re doing an unrehearsed production

today of that place what are you trying

to capture the original music which

makes you a contemporary audience feel

like they’re watching a museum piece yes

or do you want to grab some kind of

popular music and put these words to

that so that you evoke the spirit in the

audience that the original audience

would accept. right

and these kinds of

decisions are really very tricky and

they change the shape of the whole

performance so I think every play

certainly that I direct I wanted to

have its distinct set of rules and exist

in a very specific world.

right now I’m directing a production of Romeo and

Juliet I was my contract says I guess it

isn’t spelled out here but my

understanding was from the beginning

this is a Romeo and Juliet with a cast

of six the running time is sixty minutes

so part of my job as director is to cut

lots and lots of texts out figure out

how to do some creative doubling with

the actors so by the time I’ve done all

of that, there are things about the

Unrehearsed technique that I said simply

can’t bring into play yeah also a large

swathes of the text are gone so if I’m

trying to capture, you know, what

originally was this scene meant to do

well all kinds of stuff that it doesn’t

have time to do now right.

30.47

but I am

influenced by it certainly really aware

especially for me one of the really

profound things is that… (video freezes)

sorry you know sorry Bill you’ve you

froze up slightly there could you just

repeat that I’ve

unfortunately bit of a poor connection

here but if you could just repeat that

last point there

one of the things that

I find particularly influential is the

switching back and forth between Thou and

You because that’s a very big deal in

Unrehearsed Shakespeare and when I see

it in a text that I’m working on in a

rehearsed context I’m really conscious of

what that means the implications of that

even if we were rehearsing it yes I find

to be an important trigger to do

something.

I don’t think I would have

looked at that, well I know I wouldn’t

have looked at that the same way before

experiencing and rehearsed yeah we

changed my perspective in that way right

just.

I should mention you on a non

Shakespearean front that yeah I’m

intrigued by the spontaneity of this

that a couple times I’ve worked with a

version of this technique for

contemporary plays more modern plays

and to try to inspire that same

continuity when I directed Long

Day’s Journey and tonight at the

University a number of years ago I gave

everybody a script that contained only

their own lines and no cue lines so they

have it their text and then there would

be a blank space and then they’d have

their next speech and whenever they’ve

heard something that they thought that

it might be what inspired their next

they proceeded to their next line.

interesting

it was very valuable. I don’t

think you’d be doing with every cast and

in every contest that the people I was

working with in that show, it was magical

there was some wonderful unexpected

overlap and competitiveness and long

pregnant silences when we were working

that way that really evokes something

about that particular family atmosphere,

people talking over each other or

nobody knowing what to say that really

helped us capture something that became

crucial to our specific production of the play.

right interesting yeah that’s really

interesting so I I’ve got ourselves

running couple of things down as they

were coming to me just you reference you

know obviously if you’re trying to

capture the original practices of how it

was then are we also looking at doing you know

Elizabethan, Shakespearean dress or are

we looking at modern dress what do you

or is that not really that much of a

concern for you?

well this is another

place where sort of like what I

referenced in the music, yeah, you have a

sort of directorial or editorial

intervention that comes here you make a

decision about how that’s going to work

when we first when we had when the grant

money was flowing freely for Bard in the

Barn we had a great situation where we were

able to do everything with Elizabethan

costumes.

That was really exciting we

were pulling them almost exclusively

from stock but we had a large stock

to work with and we can make some small

modifications and there are certainly

places in the place where you want that

Cassius talks about walking outside

with his doublet all unbraced

well what does that mean if you were in

a t-shirt that really

changes that so one possible we want to

get that that same energy going but

there are limits to it as well okay

and a great thing is if you if you have

a comic role or a role that is, to a

great extent comic let’s give the

nursing Romeo and Juliet right you put a

man in that role and put him in an

Elizabethan dress and half way to the

comedy threshold already right on

but if you follow that through too much

and you want to get to original

practice-y with that and all of a sudden

you’re excluding all women yes from your

own company which is not something that

we’re interested in doing either.

so it seems that the more you try to

close to original practice the more you

find ways in which you are not willing

to do it like for example excluding

women.

my favorites in terms of

the look of what we’ve done have been

the ones we did with Elizabeth in

costumes but when we had less access to

those we let people pull things from

their closet that seemed appropriate to

them and you still get a sense of it you

have elements of it.

my very favorite unrehearsed could we

with period costumes outside

yeah but then see when it comes to the

music I still… we did a Twelfth Night

once that was so so beautifully received

and we started the show by asking the

audience telling (inaudible)

parameters and what these cities use as

they are permitted to behave like an

Elizabethan audience which means less

formality from them and then at the end

of that I asked the audience for

suggestions about what romantic song we

might use to start the show because the

Orsino enters saying it musically

there’s music and Orsino enters “If Music be the food of love, play on”
Rght yeah and so we got nominations and

then the audience got to vote on what

romantic song they wanted to use and

they chose the Titanic theme okay so

then our source of the music was I told

the audience to start singing the

Titanic theme song.

And they all started singing

it together and Orsino came in told them

to play on and he says “you know enough

no more it’s not so sweet now as it was

before” and he shut them up.

so they they

understood from the beginning how

participatory this could be yeah and

that was really wonderful and there’s

you can’t do that with a piece of (inaudible)

1598 right right… so

yeah interesting and it’s hang on when I

I was in a production of Romeo and

Juliet many years ago and you know I

think I can’t remember the weather it is

it was First Folio or it was a

combination but there was a there was a

show that we did where we had high

school students in.

and they they behaved

more like my understanding of how an

Elizabethan audience was um because you

know they don’t know they used to TV or

whatever it was and you know you you do

all that you have these wonderful lines

as an actor you know but soft what light

through yonder window breaks and all

that sort of stuff and it’s just words

to a degree.

but then we get an audience

like that and then you realize the scene

prior was a really rowdy scene with

Mercutio and Benvolio and yeah I think

Romeo was in there as well it’s really

rowdy seen it riled up the audience but

then we go to the romantic scene he sees

her in the balcony but the audience you

know hasn’t switched.

right the audience

is still in them the energy of the

previous scene they’re still loud you’ve

now got her to the quiet scene what are

you gonna do you’ve got one line “But

soft” yeah and and it was it was I was

able to a I can’t remember the staging

because it was 18 years ago now but I

remember you know Romeo using that line

“but soft” and everybody silenced and then

he was able to you know switch and it

was in that moment all those years ago I

was like oh you know the the text is a

lot more practical often than what we

give it credit for I know we you know we

sometimes you know when you’re away from

these original practices we sometimes

you know look at this beautiful poetic

flowery language but a lot of time it

was really practical you know there was

a lot of practicality to it.

and you know

and I think and I think you know to your

point you know using that you you know

using an audience in that way

having an audience like that you get to

then see you know an experience how how

useful that text can be. that’s really

interesting that the I just I just this

is this is I’ve got a couple of times

just home I want to go on if that’s okay

and there yeah it’s it’s less of a

question more of a statement.

you were mentioning the nurse know you know

a production of a nurse where you had a

man dressed as a nurse and Elizabethan

dress you know sort of taking it towards

the comedy

I was just wondering it reminded me do

you know much about the the British

theatre tradition of pantomime?

I know about I would say I know more than an

American layman and less than someone who

has been to see British pantomime

performances okay okay so apologies i if

I if I “Britsplain” to you but for that

just for the sake of this there

traditionally we they’re they use myths

you know urban you know really Urban’s

but more mythology so we’re looking at

you know traditional fairy tales you

know things like Hansel and Gretel,

Cinderella, Snow White that sort of thing

and traditionally speaking the lead

male character is sorry the lead female

character is often played by a male so

if it’s if you’re looking at something

like Robin Hood, Robin Hood is played by

a woman.

and then there is frequently a

mother character involved or like a

mother character who is which is often

played by an older man preferably

without facial hair and that adds part

to the comedy as well. I mean they were

obviously you know in the in the in the

age that we live in you know we were

looking at all this sort of

tradition now through a completely

different lens but looking at the lens

of how it has been from I don’t know

hundred years or so

up until now you know my understandings

that the the man wouldn’t be attempting

to be a successful you know female

performance, it would be you know woman

you know the female role plus man and

the man would be failing to achieve that…

part of the comedy was failing to

achieve a convincing female character

you know and and others and they’re you

know and they’re very specific about

drawing a distinction between drag and

pantomime it’s called a pantomime Dame

is the name of the role you know from

from my experience and from my my

learning is that that is drag involves a

lot more glitter and there’s no sort of

glitter involved in in pantomime Dame

and I think that there’s a lot more

success involved with doing that you

know of a male performer performing drag,

there’s a lot more you know that

attempting to achieve a success in that

whereas the the actor playing the Dame

role isn’t attempting to achieve

a successful portrayal of a woman.

if that makes sense and I bring that up

because there is some suggestion I don’t

think there’s agreement among scholars

but there is some suggestion that the

the Nurse (Romeo & Juliet) was almost like a proto

pantomime thing mm-hmm

would have been like you know a comic

actor maybe not net maybe not Will Kemp

but someone of that ilk you know that

playing that that motherly role which

you know and I’ll and you know whether

that was true or not a lot of those a

lot of the pantomime Dame roles that

came over that you know over the last

sort of Victorian era until now it seemed

to you know be modeled after that you

know.

yeah it’s quite interesting and it and

and not to plug myself too much

but I need but just briefly I did a

one-man show some years ago about four

or four, five years ago now called

Shakespeare’s Fools and the premise

behind it was that Will Kemp didn’t die

of the plague what happened he fell out

with Shakespeare and then he went on a

farewell tour of the Americas.

and yeah and essentially became an evening with

Will Kemp, so he would regale you know

stories and then perform his favorite

roles that he was able to do and then I

but but because of my knowledge of, you

know, the pantomime Dame and the

possibility of it you know being born in

the Nurse

I thought, I allowed him I allowed him

the privilege if you like to be able to

you know do that part this is a part and

I wanted to play and I wasn’t able to

play but here’s my version of it.

so it was kind of it was kind of a fun thing

to do with that you know with that you

know knowledge in mind yeah you know

with the connection of the audience as

well.

just to bring it back to Shakespeare a little bit more about what

we were talking about a question that

came up recently and I didn’t say I

wasn’t sure whether to ask you this

question or not so I’m sort of putting

you on the spot a little bit here, so

apologies of that do you know much about

the work of the Original Pronunciation

movement?

oh yeah you know what my

knowledge is somewhat limited I’ve seen

a few YouTube videos and so forth. right

and I the pronouncing dictionary I

don’t remember the type of others but I

own the Original Pronunciation Dictionary

I even reference it a couple times in my

book because I think there are things

anytime you’re working with any branch

of original practice I think it’s really

good idea to

acknowledge that other branches exist.

yes yes and what my

goals with the book is to stimulate

people to think not only about

specifically what we do in the 21st

century with unrehearsed but think well

that we doing and and so I bring up a

few times I point out that for example

puns that don’t work anymore because the

pronunciation is changed, but that feed

into the fabric of the whole of the

whole speech. something like that I do

reference it I haven’t had the

opportunity to see any full productions

done with the original pronunciation I’m

interested in that I would like to see

that sometime yeah not something that

I’ve seen and not something that I’ve

worked with extensively.

47.20

there’s a

company in Elgin actually that the guy

there Sean Hargadon is very

interested in a lot of original practice

ideas and he brought me up I’ve been up

there a couple times to work with actor

on… (video freezes)…

next year do full of

productions with original pronunciation

so he’s playing with those kinds of

ideas and I’m thinking perhaps I’ll

have the chance to come up and see one

of his original pronunciation.

I don’t know for sure right yeah I need buy it

because some of it is so yeah some of it

is really wonderful

some of the limited stuff that I know about

it yeah I’ll tell you one because I’m

working with Romeo and Juliet right now

one that that intrigues me and I looked

it up to see if his book gave me any

help, there is one case where there are

definitely cases where “child” rhymes with

“wild”. Okay. but there is at least one case

in Shakespeare well one case according to

Crystal, there is one place where “child”

rhymes with “spilled”

and it’s in Romeo and Juliet which is

why I was looking it up because I became

aware this whole scene is written in

rhyming this whole section the scene as

written in rhyming couplets but child

arrives instilled and I thought oh I

wonder if actually they used to say kilt

really rhyme it up and there are several

places where it actually pronounced

“child”.

so this intrigues me and I start to

question okay what does this mean does

this mean that with it enough of a

dialect thing where either was

acceptable when you… well and I just used

one of those words right “either”.

we hear someone say “either” or “either” yeah
if you open a (inaudible) was child and chilled like

that? or with the Elizabethans attuned

enough to language that if a playwright

wished to create a rhyme that didn’t

really exist and chose to say chilled

that they still heard the word having

the meaning of child but accepted the

rhyme and I don’t know the answer to

that I don’t know maybe…

(inaudible)

You were referring to Crystal which was it David or Ben were

you referring to there? ah that’s such a

good question because I was avoiding

saying the first name to make sure I

didn’t get it wrong. I think the

dictionary the Pronouncing Dictionary I

think that’s Ben Crystal.

(Editor’s note the book, The Oxford Dictionary of Original Shakespearean Pronunciation is by David Crystal)

okay cuz I know yeah my understanding… I haven’t I

I don’t know them only through some

YouTube videos… my

understandings is that David is the

father, Ben is his son and I’ve seen them

do work together.

and I think there’s

also yeah I think there’s also a book by

Paul Meier… is it Mayer?

I’m not certain… about that I’d have to

have to check that . (Editor’s note, the book is Voicing Shakespeare, Paul Meier)

there’s another put

there’s a

I’ll fight there’s a there’s a third

person there as well.

okay that’s really

interesting and what was the name of

that book can you remember no it’s

something like a Dictionary of Original

Pronunciation or something.

(Editor’s note again the book, The Oxford Dictionary of Original Shakespearean Pronunciation is by David Crystal)

I’ll look it up another reference it somewhere yeah

yeah because I asked because I thought

you know with you know your original

practices. I wondered what it would

look like you know with the with the

unrehearsed technique plus the original

pronunciation though I was intrigued by

that.

you know if I my intention to go

off on a purely personal note I don’t

know how much of this you know how much

of this are communicated to Melissa how

much you know perhaps via Facebook or by

others my husband lives in Indianapolis or

right outside of Indianapolis okay and I

work 250 miles away from there, so it’s

and now my residence is with him and I

rent a room in a boarding house you know.

this is something that I’ve been doing

for quite a few years and time for her

to stop, so I’m looking to retire after

next year from my academics position I

still wanted you know I still intend to

do work and freelance and so forth but

I’m retiring from the University.

if I were and not because I don’t like my job

but because personally I’m just I’m done

with that commute. yes a hell of a

distance yeah so if I were going to in

my career at the University was going to

last longer, I would most certainly be

looking into exactly what you’re talking

about the next step for me would be to

see if I could like maybe up for (inaudible)

do unrehearsed with original pronunciation

because it is, it’s the part of the rather

large arc of cutting edge of what’s

being done the Shakespeare now. yeah I

want to be aware of it I want my

students to be aware of it, yeah that’s

that kind of thing you know we’ve

already planned next year’s season at

the University is already set in stone.

For example and far enough in advance

that you know if I’m really going to

make moves in that direction at the

University it happens slowly it evolves

over a period of years so I’m not going

to be there long enough to see it happen,

but maybe I’ll have opportunities to

do it on my own in some other context.

Interesting. I just sort of getting

towards the end now I wanted to ask you

this is a question I’ve asked pretty

much everyone I’ve interviewed… knowing

what you know about Shakespeare and his

comedies, are there any lessons… I mean

whether it’s you know whether we’re

looking at the rehearsed or

unrehearsed… are they are there any

lessons that you feel that modern comedy

or modern comedians could still learn

from him or do you think those lessons

have all been learned?

it’s a great question I think I feel

like actually to turn the question on

its on its head a little bit, I feel like

more often I find with my college aged

students that I’m having to point out to

them look Shakespeare’s asking you to do

the kind of thing here that the

comedians you like do all the time.

we do here away in some kind of (inaudible) hassle

and they well you know I also that many

of my students don’t understand the

difference between Elizabethan England

and Victorian England because everything

that is they pre their grandparents is

stodgy and sexually uptight or something

you know which is the legacy of

the Victorian era. Right.

in their thinking when Victorianism was a

reaction to complain right and it was

the licentiousness, maybe, even of

previous eras right so yeah here is all

about the dirty jokes yeah yeah.

Oscar Wilde couldn’t be, but Shakespeare was

because it predates that so it’s it’s

getting the students to realize this

isn’t some kind of museum piece stuffy

cold in the in the words of Peter

Shaffer, well to shape Peter Schaffer’s

words, Marvel shitting Shakespeare – you

know reference Amadeus.

right when most

because he doesn’t want to write operas

about people who sound like a shit

Marvel. To get my students to understand

those these people were making the same

kinds of jokes Romeo and Juliet and keep

going that’s a but you know teenage boys

locker room talk it’s locker room talk

from the 1590 that is comparable a little

talk of today so I think that the

comedian’s of today have had a lot in

common with Shakespeare.

do they have something total different perhaps in

many cases profundity I mean I think

there are profound… (video freezes) these tragedies have moments of comedy

in them and the comedies often have some

not only great language and funny

situations but they’ll have something

interesting to say and I wish them all

of those art comic or otherwise

theatrical or otherwise wasn’t just for

consumption, but also was trying to make

a point. And I’m not sure everybody

always is I think we think you be in

time we’re getting to the top is what’s

important not having something to say.

right and I do think Shakespeare always

today yeah right. And you know, just

briefly it sort of saddens me anytime I

hear about you know Shakespeare being

removed from you know school curriculums

or you know whatever period of school

whether it’s middle school high school

or et cetera you know I always think you

know why?

you know when I was when I was

in college we were we were rehearsing a

production of we were doing a

Restoration piece it was the The Beau Defeated
 it was by one of the few female

playwrights of the Restoration and

director you know mentioned at the time

I you know I can’t remember her exact

words but she was essentially saying she

doesn’t know how she feels that you know

Shakespeare’s plays and you know to a to

a degree the plays of the Restoration

still you know still reflects our times

now are still are relevant today just in

terms of the actions that people

take the emotions that people have I

mean everything sort of you know around

us has changed the way we can

communicate has changed, you know you

know computers have changed things and

we’re on the moon and all this… but

basically we’re still this you know

we’re still the same people now she

didn’t know whether she felt I was a

good or a bad thing you know and you know

just with that in mind you know every

time I hear people saying well

Shakespeare’s terrible it’s not

relatable it’s all this dead language.

but it’s like if we can if the tools and

techniques were taught either to the

teachers and then from the teachers to

the students as a way to unlock the

language, you’ll see that we’re still the

same people.

we’re still jealous and you

know we have these you know angry and

full of joy and love and passion those

you know everything is still is still

the same.

I’m reading the book right now

which is not a not a particularly

scholarly book it’s a very user friendly

kind of book about this… it’s called Evolutionary Psychology
okay and

one of the things they talk about in it

is they reference it as the Savannah

Principle which is that humans evolve so slowly.

(inaudible) Our evolution is very very slow compared to

the evolution of animals that have a

much shorter life cycle than we, and

reproduced younger so. our minds haven’t

evolved yet to reflect any of the

advances of, I don’t even know how long

they take, but like you know of a couple

of millennia right Savannah Prince boy

is we still respond to things that we

were living on the Savannah. We might all

the we grasp the idea that somebody on

television is not present with us yes

the part of us that hasn’t evolved to

understand that and we only relate to

people in two ways, the Savannah

principal says; friend or enemy someone

who is not trying to kill you is your

friend that’s the Savannah principle so

therefore everyone we see on television

is our friend. interesting they are not

presenting a threat to us that’s only

one of many examples they give but yeah

I’m intrigued by it and I think my

biggest takeaway from the book overall

has been this idea that humans are not capable because of our

lifecycle and our reproductive age we’re

not capable of evolving quickly so we

don’t… on a profound level understand

these changes around let’s say you know

we don’t we don’t really grasp computers

I don’t really grasp communication with

people over a great distance these are

things we’re incapable of dealing with.

right yeah yeah you were you were

reminding me we were talking about

seeing people on television you remind

me sometimes you get people they watch

that you know they’re the regular TV

shows like your soap operas and then you

know the the character than they see is

the same as the the actor playing the

part. yeah and they they can flake the

two together so when so if they run into

that actor in real life or they’re like

you know what you were saying to

such-and-such yeah I you know you were

wrong and were like well hang on a

minute this is a show I’m not really

that person that’s like you’ll really

mean there’s no no no you know and it’s

interesting that you say that because I

you know that something reminded of yeah

I you know I don’t often hear it now

but I did for a you know for a period

people conflate the two and you know you

sometimes and access walking down the

street and they shouting abuse at the

accent because they’re you know playing

a bad guy on TV or whatever it is. that’s

like whoa hang on.

okay that’s that’s really interesting that’s great a lot

more you you think a lot more profundity

and a lot you know having you know more

of a point for modern comedy?

yeah and and maybe I’m maybe I’m selling

modern comedy short I don’t

maybe I don’t see enough of it to have a

a strong opinion, but can you like… (inaudible)

and like some people get to the… well you

know okay it’s not that it wasn’t around

then right what (video freezes)

…not interested in profundity, but he was

working in Shakespeare’s plays, on text

that had a profound underpinning. so

sorry who was that you we froze up so

Will Kemp.

we okay yeah so if not as

though comedians who just want to clown

and get the laughs or anything new

because they probably have existed as

long as as long as there was language,

maybe even before.

right but but I’m I’m

always less interested in those people

unless they exist in a context… (video freezes)

I find that hard to articulate but all

right interesting but then I guess not

though I want to get into much of a

debate back and forth of that list a bit

it’s just something I’m obviously I’m

intrigued by do you do you not feel then

there’s a place for just escapist art

where people can sort of you know

because it’s so much like now there’s so

much news happening, you know globally,

lots of different things everyone sort

of switches on the news and you think

everything’s really bad yeah you know I

just want I don’t want to then go to the

theatre go to a movie go to a comedy

show or what have you and then have that

reflects it back to me all the time.

absolutely so I have a couple thoughts

about, that one of them is that I think

we can we could see entertainment that

we might think of as escapist in that it

does not deal with politics, or Global

warming or to some of these issues that

press down on us right.

yeah but has

something profound to say about the

relationships between mothers and their
sons that’s a different kind of

profanity yes there’s comedy about

mothers and sons that reveals a deeper

truth about mothers and sons that is

both escapist, and has some kind of

sniffing boss behind it I think the the

thing that concerns me more is trying to

identify… (inaudible)… do that thing so that

I get a lot of attention regardless of

what I have to say it’s about it’s about

my Twitter followers.

 it’s not and now

you know New York is buying into this

and part of the basis of casting

decisions is how many Twitter followers

given an has yeah because then that will

attract an audience you know it’s got to

be somewhere something has got to be

about more than economic self-interest.

right yeah but (inaudible) a successful

businessman so it’s not like he didn’t

get that but two tracks were running

there yeah yes interesting yeah because

that is a part of it now isn’t it you

know how many Twitter followers do you

have it may almost makes you less of a person

or you know maybe less of a performer

if you have a small number versus a

large number it’s like we’ll hang on you

know, I know people who aren’t on

social media doesn’t make them you know

doesn’t make them less of a person, or

less of a performer right right um yeah

my you know I’m on I’m on Twitter but I

I don’t often use it so I have a low a

subscriber count right now okay

but isn’t anything I’m concerned

about.

yeah you know I it goes up it goes

down it goes up you know it’s like okay

it doesn’t sort of impact it doesn’t

really impact maybe it should I don’t

know but it doesn’t really impact me on

a day-to-day basis you know it doesn’t

you know alter my worth.

you know if I was to do you know if I

was to put on a show

oh I might start thinking differently

about that yeah because you want to

market and you want to reach people you

know I had a student tell me a very

astute student,

started to work on the book I really

needed to get a Twitter account because

it would it would help in promoting the

book.

and I just couldn’t bring myself to

do it I thought you know what

now I especially my goals of the book

aren’t to – yeah – to put notches on my

bedpost about how many people know about

it and how large a following I have quite

frankly the royalties on it I get four

dollars a copy right oh it’s not I mean

it’s never going to be Harry Potter

right I’m not gonna just who’s not my

retirement nest egg right it’s not for

me it isn’t worth wading into cuz I’m

not interested in Twitter. I have a Facebook

account that’s enough for me

you know yeah yeah yeah and I said you

know this is a 20 year old person who’s

ambitious and needs to look for what’s

going to be working in her career.

right I’m on the end of that I don’t write it

right and you know I don’t need it.

I’m on Twitter I was on it for a period and then I left

some years ago and I came back and you

know and it’s fine because you know to

to a degree it I find it odd because to

a degree I feel like I’m just sort of

you know metaphorically standing there

talking waiting for someone to talk to

me so I either I’m talking or you know

and then if I’m talking and then someone

might be arguing with me it’s like you

know I don’t really want an argument you

know I don’t want to I don’t want to

maybe have a conversation with the

people I’ll get to know people meet new

people.

I don’t want to just go right you

know person I’ve never met before

let’s have an argument yeah I don’t

wanna I don’t want to spend my time to

bring that you know yeah meeting new

people like yourself how many

conversation you know about areas that

we were interested in rather going well

actually Bill you know you mentioned

that but I think you’re wrong this like

what no we don’t why do we need to get

into that you know it’s just just

doesn’t make any sense.

so you know what I well I how I use it is I I try to just

I see other people talking and I

ship in if they ask a question I try to

answer it and I just try to engage

people to have conversations. you know

rather than and you know I don’t know if

that’s right or wrong but it’s kind of

how I do it you know I’m not I I do have

that “I suppose I’d better go and check

Twitter you know so you’ve mentioned a

couple times about a book you’ve written

a book, or is it or you’re still writing

it?  It’s called Performing Shakespeare Unrehearsed: A Practical Guide to Acting and Producing Spontaneous Shakespeare.

and do you have a website

for it? I don’t this because I haven’t

bought a bit of my own because Routledge

which published it? oh yeah ok infinitum

I’m sorry I’m sorry I missed I missed

the route which part

yeah that’s great yeah and it’s on so if

I went to the Routledge website is on

there area planning on yeah although all

these – nice nice

and when when did you when did you

publish that last March came out the

end of last month.

it was my sabbatical

ok and you know – because I’ve never

I’ve not done anything like that before

and I thought it was going to be

enormously time-consuming and I think

there’s probably only one book in me and

that was it.

ok but I’ve been working so

long with this you know more than 10

years using a lot of workshops will do

the productions that writing the book

was much easier than I thought.

I structured it exactly the way that my

workshops are structured, with a couple of exception
and so I didn’t need to

create an outline because the outline

has evolved a lot of a number of

workshops that I’ve done.

yeah it was like workshop where I never had to stop

talking you know I could give more

examples and and go into more detail

about some of the things that we need to

just generalize in the workshop.

so the writing of the book happened very very

fast I was amazed. well partly also

because I I couldn’t seem to stop I

would I told myself that I would write

at least an hour a day I thought I

needed that amount of discipline and

frequently I wouldn’t be willing to stop

and I write this three and a half hours

four hours I’d be staying up late at

night because I wanted to get more done.

and so suddenly I found myself

approaching the end of the first draft

of the book and, actually, my sabbatical

hadn’t even started yet it was still

summer. Oh wow.

Because I’ve been so

worried that I wouldn’t be able to write

it within the allotted time yes but I

did in March yeah I kept going and you

know a year almost to the day a year

from when I started writing it it was

impressed. Wow

Which is ridiculously fast but and as I think

where I should try to write something

else it would take me years yeah it’s

just that well my mother said :you know

well you you’ve been writing this book

for 10 years”.

yeah you know yeah and was

this I don’t mean to pry too much but

was this essentially you pitched this to

Routledge, before you started writing

It? yes I by well to people mainly my

mother and my husband had been saying to

me for a while there needs to be a book

there needs to be a book.

And even at

some point someone said if you don’t

write this book somebody else is going

right I thought well that’s certainly

true so so then I fight the sabbatical

(inaudible) I lost my train of thought… your original question?
well I was just

asking you about the book and if

you pitched the idea of a book to Routledge
before you started writing?

right, right so then I applied for my

sabbatical a sabbatical application to

the University and my proposed project

was I would write this book.

And was granted the sabbatical and then was at

the Southeast Theatre conference and

chatting with a friend and told her that

I had sabbatical coming up and I said

that you know I know I can write the

book but I don’t know anything about is

you know how to get it to a publisher I

don’t I don’t even know how that works

and she said oh did you know that

representatives of Routledge are here and

I’m acquainted with one of them.

so I walked you know I don’t know four rows

and two booths over at FCTC and there

was a representative from Routledge and

it had happened it’s actually great because I

my friend presented me and said you know

this is Bill Kincaid he has a book (inaudible)

I said oh yeah well what is that and I

gave her a sort of 30-second synopsis of

what I wanted to write and from behind

me came before us

you should really publish this man’s

work he taught me everything I know

about Shakespeare and I turned around

and it was a former student of mine who

already had a publishing contract with

Routledge oh wow look which hasn’t come

out yet by the way but so he knew this

woman personally he happened to be right

there and vouched for me in the moment now of

course I still had to go through the

process of writing an official proposal

for the book writing a chapter that got

reviewed by some experts in the field

and that kind of thing but… yes… so

there was there was that typical process

but he was

really pretty simple the way did it turned out.
simply then then it might have

been I don’t I would have had to go

through the process I mean I know Routeledge

which is a great comfort right but yeah

I would have felt with any of your

research what companies might be good

for it and they just would have been a

whole process that I yeah yeah that’s

good.

so the in terms of so there’s your

book Performing Shakespeare Unrehearsed: A Practical Guide to Acting and Producing Spontaneous Shakespeare
and there’s also one that was published

but 75 years ago you were referencing?

(video freezes) 1.17

No, that’s Shakespeare’s Producing Hand: A Study of His Marks of Expression to be Found in the First Folio.

right oh sorry you froze up on me a

little bit there we would I

I didn’t get I didn’t get your reply on

Unfortunately. Sorry. it was… we were

referencing a book Acting from Shakespeare’s First Folio?
 
right and that was probably published around ten or twelve

years ago his research the beginning

they trace it back to work that was done

seventy-five years ago. But Don Weingust’s

actual book talking about the history of

the evolution of the technique that was

published probably around 12 years ago.

Also by Routledge, by the way,

which was kind of a cool in, and he wound

up being one of the reviewers for my

proposal which I was pleased about.

and  then there’s a book called Secrets of

Acting Shakespeare by Patrick Tucker. okay

that one, it’s so hard to guess years now

without employment 25 years ago. Maybe?

and he was the first one to really start

putting some of these things down on

paper but his honestly he’s much less

prescriptive then my book is and less

specific than that in a lot of ways

but I mean there’s a really huge debt

of gratitude there because he has one

who really got the ball rolling but one

thing that I say and certainly different

practitioners of original practice stuff

feels very differently about this, in

many cases I say look do not question do

not try to justify but the language is

making you do here let the audience fill

in the gaps you do what the language

says.

it’s not about an after having an

interpretation of the role it’s about an

actor executing the instructions that

the language is given, giving them and

it’s a different way of looking at

things and it’s not a very 21st century

way of looking at things.

1.19

it’s not a very

Stanislavski way of looking at things right

but my yeah but but it is my perspective

on how to work with unrehearsed you do

it let the audience figure out their

interpretation it’s not that it’s well

right it’s very easy in an unrehearsed

production of a play that you don’t know

well very easy to get lost and not have

any idea what’s going on in the plot

yeah and that’s unusual for us we want

to sit around it huh

why didn’t Masha first have these

feelings for Constantine or whatever we

want to spend a lot of time delving into

that and have our own emotional

connection to it.

Unrehearsed Shakespeare demands the opposite you

don’t have to know a thing about Hotspur

and Lady Percy’s love for one another.
what you have to do is go close to her when you say
“Thou” and create some distance when you

say “You”.

The audience sees that constant

thing, that physical dynamic between you and

put their own understanding on it of

what it means for two young passionate

married  people to be close to one another

or far away from one another while we

are having an argument.

right that’s how

ever got it that my take in my book.

Patrick Tucker’s I think is very very

different from that but as I take huge

debt of gratitude, yes, and he also does

something that I specifically shied away

from which is he tried to make the

argument this is how the Elizabethans

did it. Okay. And I allow him to make that

argument and I say regardless of how the

Elizabethans did it this is really cool

it’s a lot of fun, yeah, it will you to

look more closely at what is written for

you. right From alternate spellings

to punctuation to use the pronouns.



And are there any over overlaps with John

Barton’s Playing Shakespeare, you know

it’s just in terms of you know the the

the clues and the ways into the text

that he refers to I would say that this

is a more mechanical version of some of

that, because he’s still trying to from

what I recall I haven’t watched it

recently but like yeah his real goal

still has to do with finding away into

emotional truth right yes that fair

thing yeah it’s been a while but maybe

as well.

yeah and I performing Shakespeare unrehearsed
in my way has nothing to do with emotional truth if

there’s any emotional truth going on

it’s going to be happening out in the

audience right we’re executing something

and the audience is… the audience is

having the emotional experience and we

are not. Right. But although there are

emotional experiences that are

spontaneous, yes we did Measure for Measure…

in Measure for Measure Claudio is

condemned to be executed going on about

head cut off

but then there’s

this what plot hatched, wow that’s a lame word

they figure out how to avoid executing

Claudio because they’re going to

substitute the decapitated head of

another prisoner right okay but they

give out the news that Claudio has been

executed his head has been cut off well.

so Isabella who is Claudia’s sister

here’s only that Claudio has been

executed and then in at five when he

shows up and he’s alive it’s a complete

surprise to her okay so you do measure

for measure unrehearsed you cast to

people who are good friends as Claudio

Isabella she has to at one point tell

Ian your life is worthless to me than my

virginity and then in a later scene

she’s been off stage she hasn’t heard

all the all the dialogue that went

between in a later scene she’s told he

has been executed.

so the actor who by

the way I took care to cast someone who

had never read the play the actor

believes that that has happened in the

plot of the play so in Act Five when

Claudio shows up alive it’s a parallel

emotional experience for the actor to

the emotional experience of Isabella because she

think he’s dead in response to that is

emotional and spontaneous. So

there’s emotion to it but she didn’t

plan it a rehearsed production measure

here

the actor is worried about okay how do I

create the illusion of the first time

here and yes said that I don’t have this

information

yeah she didn’t have it right in and she did

begin to cry at that moment if she

happens to be a really emotionally

accessible person yeah – which helps

right but yeah but you have things like

that are really exciting outgrowth of

this.

yeah because you know an audience

then you know the the performance that

is sorry that you’re just

watching the performance around like a

blank slate and then it’s what the

audience is bringing to that right yeah

yeah

rather than the actors worrying

about oh why I cried last night and now

we’re doing the thing again I don’t know

I’m worried I’ll cry again tonight you

know yeah yeah it’s really really really

interesting I love all this stuff that’s

great okay I think that’s basically it

We referenced your book Performing Shakespeare Unrehearsed: A Practical Guide to Acting and Producing Spontaneous Shakespeare which is on the

Routledge website or Amazon and all

good bookstores.

yes you don’t have a website right no and what about Bard in

the Barn does that have one? you know I

was surprised when you said you didn’t

find one because I would have thought

there I would have thought that the

University web pages about it are still

up and would come up in a Google search

but maybe they maybe they don’t.

yeah I mean all I could find I think was a like

a Facebook page for it I think

mm-hmm I certainly have another search

for it well and you know you remind me

of something that probably is very

important that now that I’m retiring

from the University probably need to

have a website so that when people

search for me they don’t just go to my

you know there’s my profile page on the

University ya know who can find me etc

and I probably need something more than

that as I as I move into my academic

retirement.

right right okay great

well Bill, this has been you know

tremendous I everything yeah I’m sort of

like I will say to you earlier on

everything that’s because this is like

your open Pandora’s box for me so you

know hence there is a lot more

stuttering a lot more thinking things

through yeah I mean I I’m glad I have

this information now or I’m aware of

this information but you know I also

wish I would have had it sooner

obviously not through a whole of your

own I’m talking about when I was in high

school yeah you know this you know it’s

like you having having being given a car

not being told how to drive it and then

not being given the keys.

but here’s the car it looks nice but you know and I

can’t I can’t go anywhere with it so I

just got and then I’m given 36 other you

know 36 other cars I’ve all of these

cars yeah but no one’s given me the

tools yeah well they’re you know the

knowledge about how to access and drive

these vehicles and you know and it’s

great now that you know I know this is a

out there and hopefully if anyone

watches or listens to this you know it

has always been a bit you know “urgh,

Shakespeare” you know you know there are

tools that are our techniques they’re a

road maps out there or at least people

tell you how to read the road maps.

I should say yeah that’s great

well and I for my unrehearsed class this

semester I even and I hope this is a

backfire on me I don’t think it will I

have nine graduate students in it who

obviously know their way around right

but I also have some freshmen because I

said look I don’t want any prerequisites

on this class I think they’re going to

be people who come in whoever

relationship to the language and there

will also be people whose only lifeline

is what I’m saying to them and we’ll see

those people though their energies

colliding in projects yeah in the

classroom and we’ll see what that’s like

I think it’s going to be really great

because there will be people coming at

it from more of your place and yes be

people who are having one of their first

experiences with Shakespeare.

so yeah that’s great we should yeah well good

luck with it why should sorry I should say break a

leg with it thank you and I hope the

production of Romeo and Juliet that

you’re directing now goes well thank you

it’s in good shape.

great yeah that’s it that’s all I have

thank you very much indeed for your time.

uh you know of course that inherent in

all this or or implied in all this is if

you want to come down to Macomb and see

some Unrehearsed Shakespeare in April it

would be wonderful tap

you there it’s such a such not a tourist

destination so you may never have been

there I have never been but you know if

if you want to let me know because that

that would be fun it this whole

conversation with you…

well, reminds me that it’s been a long

time since I’ve spent time with your

wife I would like to do that.

It makes me think I have to find a way that I can

come up and hang out with you and meet

your children and talk nerdy the

International Phonetic Shakespeare stuff with you and be

human beings together that would be nice

yes yeah I would love that we let’s make

that happen.

yes yeah please let’s do that that would

be great and and Macomb April I will I

will discuss it with my better half.

thank you again thank you so

much for your time I appreciate thanks

lots of fun thank you good luck