To Do Shakespeare or Not to Do Shakespeare?
This post is long overdue, as are many more. Hopefully I can catch up this summer.
I started this process probably back in February. After my last play with my students, I asked them what they wanted to do next. A few of them requested Shakespeare. I teach Shakespeare in the summer so they are at least familiar with who he is. My sister had given me a Shakespeare for Kids book for Christmas so I thought I would start there. I was planing on just reading, "A Midsummer Nights Dream," and possibly doing a few scenes from it or doing another Shakespeare play. Midsummer has a very complicated plot and a lot of "lovey dovey," not super kids appropriate themes. When we read through it, they thought it was hilarious. I forget what they were laughing at now, its been so long, but I was shocked by how much they enjoyed it and were able to follow the plot. After reading it I gave them 3 three options: we could do scenes from the play, the whole play, or something else entirely. They almost all said that they wanted to do the whole play. I was reminded how often I underestimate my students and how when given a challenge, they will rise to it. My friend from high school who also teaches theatre at an after school program has told me that if you set the bar high, they will reach it. I see that more and more.
Casting
I really struggled with casting the play because I had to find kids who would be ok with the lovey dovey "lovers" parts, and Flute, a boy who must be dressed as a girl at the end. I was surprised by this one 2nd grader who wanted to be Demetrius. I never thought he could handle it, but he did a great job. I cast a girl as Puck. I had given her a very small role in the last play, but something about her just screamed Puck to me. I was worried because her behavior is often very difficult. Although sometimes I regretted it when she was back stage, I never regretted it when she was onstage. She was a natural and clever Puck. She took on this role so much that she insisted I call her Puck outside of rehearsals and even told her friends to start calling her this. I felt very proud. I had an amazing Bottom that did a great job with his final death scene. He would crack us up all the time in rehearsal. I had to change the role of Flute halfway through, but the boy who ended up doing it did great, was a little embarrassed but still went for it. And isn't that what acting is anyway.
Shakespeare would roll over in his grave
My boss wanted me to try to add music to the play since our end of the year show is supposed to be a musical. What a nightmare. I am not a musical theatre person. I do not do choreography well. I can do kinder hand motions to songs but that's about as far as I can get. I thought the easiest way would be to take popular songs and just change the words slightly to fit the story. I had the kids help me come up with this. It made them more connected to the show and it were songs that they liked. Shakespeare would roll over in his grave but here is what we came up with. We changed "Baby Got Back" to "I am Nick Bottom, and I can not lie, you Mechanical can not deny. I can play a girl with a itty bitty waist or a loud roar in your face..." We changed "Sexy and I know it" to "I'm a Fairy and I know it." When Lysander falls in love with Helena he sang to Hermia Taylor Swifts, "We Are Never Getting Back Together." When they all get married they sang Bruno Mars, "Marry You." And our grand finale at the end of the play we changed "Gangnam Style" into "Shakespeare Style." They were most excited about this. In fact, most of them said that doing the dance was their favorite part of the show.
Creating :)
As with the last play, I had a lot fun creating the set and some of the costumes. It felt less crazy than the last plays. I was very excited about my tree and my t-shirts that hopefully helped the audience follow the love story a bit. It brings be great joy to create all this. One of the best moments of the process for me came when I was showing some of the students so props that I was working on. One student said to me, "Why did you buy all this stuff?" Another student responded to her, "Because she loves us." It felt really good to be appreciated and for them to see that I did all this because I love them.
Rehearsals
The rehearsal process went pretty well. There always comes a point where some of them know it well and get bored and lazy with it. Its always hard to push past that. There was a huge gap at this point between my students who knew it all and those that didn't even have their lines down. Its funny that the kids I cast as the Mechanicals, really were the Mechanicals. They were this eclectic group of fumbling kids who couldn't stand still or focus. I felt like Quince trying to wrangle them.
If we shadows have offended...
Although it was a kids version of the play it did have a good amount of one lines from Shakespeare. It made me so happy to hear them say these line. "I love thee not, therefore pursue me not." "The course of true love never did run smooth." "And through this cranny shall Pyramus and Thisbe speak." "Let me not play a woman, I have a beard coming." Although I truncated it, Puck's final speak was all the original Shakespeare.
Performance
The day of the performance rand very smoothly. Going in I felt pretty calm. I was very organized, I felt like the kids were pretty ready. I felt more prepared than other shows. We did have one kid not show up because he got sick. I quickly grabbed my MC, taught him a dance in 5 minutes and gave him a clipboard with a script. He was able to jump in and did a great job. One of my other favorite moments from the play is when I was getting them in costume. One of my students has a huge attitude problems and complains about everything. I had showed him part of his costume a few weeks earlier and he later complained to me that he didn't like it and could I get him another one. But when I put his whole costume on him he said, "This is actually really cool. I like it." That could only be the words of the Lord speaking through him, because that child would never have said that about anything. The show ran so smoothly that for parts of it I was able to just sit back and take a few pictures. I didn't feed anyone a line. The only awkward parts came because costume changes took a little too long. But the kids hadn't practiced this. The parents laughed. Many parents came up to me afterwards and told me that they really enjoyed it. I could not have been more proud of them. It was probably the best production I have done at this school.
No comments:
Post a Comment