Why did you want to tackle two of the Late Plays as your contribution to the CWF [RSC Complete Works Festival]?

The idea started with The Winter’s Tale. It is my favorite play and for many years I have been thinking about a production which involves the audience in the public and private dynamic of the play. I was also interested in the process of exploring two plays with one company of actors. Pericles seemed the obvious choice to go alongside Winter’s Tale. Both plays are about an idea of rebirth, spiritual and physical. Both plays take their protagonists on very extreme punishing journeys. In Winter’s Tale, spiritual evolution is related to the passing of time - time is the great healer. In Pericles it is all about place, the journey is physical, one of physical separation. But I believe the possibility of rebirth is something Shakespeare was obsessed with in his late plays.

The plays are planned to be performed in promenade. Can you explain what that means exactly, and how are you going to design the Swan to accommodate the promenaders?

I love promenade performances because the audience is directly involved in the action of the play. They are part of it. This doesn’t mean there will be audience participation but it does mean that some scenes will be played amongst the audience and other scenes will require the audience to move around the space to see the scenes. To make this work we are boarding over all the ground floor seats in the Swan and creating a large playing area that the audience will inhabit along with the actors. There will be raised areas around this space where scenes or parts of scenes will be played. Over the course of the performance it will be possible for members of the audience to rest and find a perch if necessary, but they should feel as if they’re in Sicilia or Bohemia or Antioch. Of course some people are not physically able to wander around the space and others are nervous about it so we’re keeping the two galleries as seated and it will only be the ground floor area of the Swan that will be for the promenaders.

How would you recommend the experience of promenading to potential bookers? Is it better than sitting down?

There’s no question that these shows will be infinitely more exciting and vivid for the promenaders. Shakespeare so often feels remote as an experience for audiences. To find yourself as an onlooker at Hermione’s trial or being a guest at the sheep shearing is a uniquely involving experience and draws you into the play. Also if you have a bad view at any given time you are free to change position or be as close or as distant from a scene as you like. I’m convinced that many people who buy seated tickets will want to move downstairs after the interval to be part of the experience.

I know it’s well in advance of rehearsals, but can you tell us a little bit about where you are intending to set the plays? (ie. What the concept is going to be?)

One of the distinctive features of The Winter’s Tale is that there’s a sixteen year gap in the middle of the play. In this gap there’s an emotional thawing, a softening in the tone of the play. I started thinking about what two periods in living memory, with a sixteen year gap, had such an extreme change in atmosphere. I wondered whether, if we started the play in the mid fifties, a time of paranoia and anxiety about male and female roles, this would be an appropriate background to Leontes’ paranoia. That would mean that when we go to Bohemia we would move to the flower power years of the late sixties, which was a much more relaxed and youthful time and a time of generational conflict. It would also give the sheep shearing festival a Woodstock feel, which felt playful and appropriate.

With Pericles I became intrigued by Marina’s plight of a young woman forced to work in a brothel in a foreign city. This reminded me of the plight of the many girls working now in London and other western cities who are victims of sex traffic. So Pericles picks up from where Winter’s Tale leaves off and moves into the present day. Having said all this I’m very wary of being too literal in transposing plays from one time to another. We’re going for an atmosphere rather than a reality. For me Shakespeare’s plays always exist as much in the theatre as they do in any real place or time. They exist in a poetic reality.

The two plays are cross-cast and play in quite a tight repertoire together. How does this affect the actors? Do you think it brings something special to audiences?

Repertoire is the best way for actors to work together. With this project most of the actors will be in both shows and will benefit from the relationships they form with each other in different roles and circumstances. Also, the actors don’t have the relentlessness of eight performances a week of one show which can be deadening. Equally the audiences love seeing actors play contrasting roles from one night to the next. With these two plays there are fascinating resonances between roles—parallel roles which comment on each other. For example, both Hermione in Winter’s Tale and Thaisa in Pericles are married to the protagonists and both come back to life in some form. When one actress plays both roles she will bring the resonances from one part to the next and the audience can make the connection between the two. This will help make both plays feel like one event.

How do you feel about being part of the RSC’s Complete Works Festival? What do you think audiences will get out of it?

The Festival is a truly unique event for audiences. I believe the more of Shakespeare’s work you see in performance the deeper your appreciation and enjoyment of his work becomes. This year in Stratford you can get to see the whole lot performed in diverse and unpredictable ways. I’m excited to be part of that.

You are just starting the casting process. Can you explain a little about your approach to that?

Well, I’m trying as much as possible to cast people through into both plays. Because we’re rehearsing the plays together Pericles and Leontes will be played by one actor each. The parts are just too big to rehearse alongside other roles. Everyone else will play at least one role in each show, and where possible roles that relate to each other. I cast very instinctively. I’m looking not only for suitability and talent but also for artists that I can have a rapport with. I’ve learned that I do my best work when I have a relaxed and respectful relationship with my actors. I find that allows for an atmosphere where actors can take risks and make mistakes. This allows for the creation of the best and boldest work, I believe. Although I do think it’s necessary to challenge your actors from time to time, I’m not someone that thrives on conflict in a rehearsal room. So when I meet people in audition it’s very important to me that I feel we can get along.

For More Information
Please contact Bethany Prestigiacomo, Director of Artist Residency Programs, Davidson College via email (rscdavidson@davidson.edu) or phone at 704-894-2115.