The Life and Times of Julius Caesar
Wollongong Theatre Company loves to work with Shakespeare's plays. We are currently in the creative development phase of our next production, an abridged adaptation of Shakepeare's Julius Caesar. Our production team pictured here (L-R: James Philpot, Glen Woolgar, Tim Allen and Louisa Raft) are meeting on a regular basis to read through the script, talk about the key themes and elements of the play that we would like to realise on the stage, and how we can get those ideas across in the most succinct, thought-provoking and engaging way, particularly for people who may not be regular theatre-goers, or familiar with Shakespeare.
Of course, there are some people who think of Shakespeare purely from a literary perspective and believe we shouldn't change his work in any way. We approach his texts as contemporary theatre-makers, as we believe Shakespeare and his company of players did. After all, the works were performed before they were published in written form, and through the performance process, the scripts were dynamic, relevant to audiences and changed over time. The beauty of Shakespeare's plays is that they still have lots to say, through every age, and in all sorts of contexts.
We love Shakespeare's language, so in our adaptations we don't "modernise" the language. Not one bit. We abridge, sometimes taking out scenes that we don't think drive the action from the audience's perspective. We might merge characters. But we absolutely love the challenge of working with Shakespeare's words - really trying to understand what they mean and how they sound and using them to play the action. If you've ever seen a "bad" production of Shakespeare - one where you couldn't follow the action, understand the relationships, or felt it was all going over your head, it could very well have been because the actors did not really understand what they were saying. For all of us at Wollongong Theatre Company, that is a critical factor in the creative development, rehearsal period and in bringing the play to life on the stage.
What do you think about "tinkering" with Shakespeare?
