Shakespeare on Campus

——British Plays by White Horse

By: Pre-DP 10 (1)  Agnes Pei

On the night of Dec.2nd and Dec.3rd, we had the opportunity to appreciate the professional drama performances brought by White Horse travelling all the way from Germany. Shakespeare plays of three different levels have been revised and interpreted, all presented impressive and professional way.

As one of the volunteers present on the first day of the performance, I was lucky to have the chance to appreciate the elementary level and the advanced level with two completely different scenarios as well as language style.

Though being different levels of drama, the excellence in manipulation of facial expressions and gestures was both beyond our expectation and placed us in the real scenarios. I was especially interested in how the scene was set up. Because of our limitation of stage area on the local campus, the screen designer had to compress the acting area into which is much smaller than theatres. They did a wonderful job in designing where the props are placed and how effectively they are used during the play. During the entire process of performance I paid special attention to how they manipulated the script and change of location and props in their hand so that the audience will understand the location and thus the plot.

As for Twelfth Night, revision of the scenario and the props has even more difficulty. Since I already appreciated the play conducted by Class 3 last semester, I had a better look in to the classical work of Shakespeare with comparison. Having only four actors and such a complicated story, I have to admire the fantastic work done by the actors to make us not only understand how the story goes but also feel the atmosphere that Shakespeare wanted to present to us.

Interactions with audience have been mixed into the performance with special consideration. In My Cousin Charles, audience was asked what to put in the “evil” cousin’s bed. I love the way how the actress smiled to the sixth and seventh graders, everything seemed warm in the room. And in Twelfth Night, one of the audience from DP was actually given a cop hat and brought to the stage for improvise performance. The creativity of such can be learned by our students, interactions can add taste into the performance itself.

I guess we are all grateful to have such chance to appreciate Shakespeare’s play on campus, feeling the intimacy of art of drama. There’re still things for us to learn and experience about British culture, experiences of such always bring motivations.