Teens Stage Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'
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David Slone-dslone@timesuniononline.com
Teenagers doing Shakespeare? And they like it?
That's the case with students participating in this summer's theatre workshop at the Wagon Wheel Theatre. The workshop is designed for students in middle and high school to improve their acting while working with acting professionals Andy Robinson and Ben Dicke.The teens will present William Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" at 1 p.m. Saturday at the Wagon Wheel.
"It's a lot of fun because it's a great atmosphere with everyone being here. At the same time, it's hard because you can't improvise because it's got a certain line scheme," said Cameron Carter, 13, who will be an eighth-grader this fall.
For high school junior Ashley Skaggs, 16, "Midsummer" is a great play to get started on with Shakespeare because it has a host of interesting characters.
Luke Secaur, 14, freshman, said a lot of the show has to be done with body language because the audience may not understand all the words. But that shouldn't stop them from enjoying the show.
"I think the audiences will love it," said Carter.
The cast just started rehearsing the show Friday. But by Tuesday afternoon, they were finishing up with blocking Act IV.
Secaur said by the 1 p.m. Saturday show time, "We will be ready." Carter said the show was coming along quite well because the cast had scenes memorized by the time blocking of a scene was completed.
The experience is teaching the students a lot, too, they said.
"We're learning how to be expressive with our language," said Skaggs.
Secaur said he didn't know how anyone could put on a production of Shakespeare until he started working on this one. Carter said they're learning teamwork because in order to keep the scenes moving, the actors have to work with each other.
"I'm learning Shakespeare can be a lot more fun than people make it out to be," said Ally Ferber, 15, a high school sophomore. Shakespeare's works have a lot of word play in them, she said.
In "A Midsummer Night's Dream," Ferber plays Hermia in the first half of the show, and Ashley plays her in the second half. Carter plays Lysander, Hermia's love interest, while Secaur is Bottom.
"I'm turned into a donkey by a fairy," said Secaur. "Me and my group, The Mechanicals, perform the play within a play."
Ferber said she thinks the character of Puck is one of the most fun characters in the show. Carter likes Bottom because he thinks Bottom thinks he's better at acting than he really is. Skaggs said the characters are all exaggerations of personalities that still can be found in today's society.
The whole workshop experience, Ferber said, has been amazing, and the performance Saturday will entertain the audience.
Robinson and Dicke said the students are moving right along. "It's going great," said Robinson. "This is the third year we've done this for middle school and high school kids."
Eight or nine of the 22-23 kids in the workshop have been with the program since it started, Robinson said. All but maybe five have worked with Robinson and Dicke or at the theater before, said Dicke.
"It's been really nice to see these kids sort of grow, and to nurture them," said Dicke. That was partially the reason they chose to do Shakespeare this year. It gives the kids a different challenge.
In the first year of the workshop, Robinson said, they did a play based on a book adaptation, "Alice in Wonderland." The second year, they did a full musical. Since many of the students in the workshop have been around the theater for awhile, Robinson said they thought bringing the students Shakespeare would be a good idea.
"And they're taking to it," said Dicke. He said he wasn't worried whether or not they could memorize their lines, but how they would deal with the material in other ways. People have a lot of negative connotations with Shakespeare. On the first day, Dicke said they talked to the students about Shakespeare and how to approach it.
Robinson said what they drove home to the students was that acting a line of Shakespeare takes doing some homework. They have to understand what they are saying. When a student uses the word "sweetmeats" in the production, they have to know it means chocolate candies. The word "wood" can mean crazy. So in order to convey the story to the audience, the actors have to understand the words themselves.
"When you act Shakespeare for the first time, and you do it successfully, it's one of the most satisfying things," said Robinson.
Dicke said he and Robinson love the naysayers. Last year, when they decided to do the musical in only eight days, people said it couldn't be done, but they did it.
"It's not about us being able to achieve it," said Dicke, "it's these kids. ... It's exciting and it's going to be good."
"I hope people will come and see some really good theatre," said Robinson.
