Stepping up for Thailand

Published on October 22, 2007

Audience members who attended the two performances of the Zurich Ballet's re-interpretation of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" earlier this month probably still smile as they recall how six seemingly ordinary people tried to stage a scene from "Pyramus and Thisbe" with hilarious results.

While credit goes to artistic director Heinz Spoerli for adding Shakespeare's spoken lines to the classical narrative ballet, our thanks should also go to Nopamat Veohong, an award-winning translator and professor of dramatic literature, for providing the Thai translations of the text, which were projected on side screens and helped us enjoy the scenes even more.

And, of course, praise must also be heaped on the six actors from the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC), especially Anthony O'Donnell who acted in - and, for the first time in his illustrious stage career, danced - the role of Bottom. Indeed, his pas de deux with prima ballerina Sarah-Jane Broadbeck, who played Titania, helped Spoerli weave ballet and theatre together.

A few days before this "Dream" was realised on stage, comedic star Anthony O'Donnell, and the director of these scenes, Bill Alexander, the RSC's honorary associate director, neither of who had ever worked with Zurich Ballet before, chatted with The Nation.

"Earlier this year, Bill asked me if I'd be interested in playing Bottom. I'd never played the ass before so of course I said yes. Then he said it was a slightly unusual gig. It was with the Zurich Ballet, who's been doing this production [using real stage actors] for more than 10 years. So, Bill got together a group of actors who had worked for RSC and the National Theatre," says O'Donnell.

"He also told me ,'You've got to dance'.  'What sort of dance?' I asked. He said, 'Ballet dancing.' I've never done any ballet dancing in my life! And the whole premise of this production is Puck transforming Bottom into an ass, and Titania falling in love with him. Those scenes with the fairies are danced by Titania, the corps de ballet, and me, trying to dance as an ass!"

O'Donnell, who rehearsed with the ballet company in Zurich for just one week, had no trouble proving to Bangkok audiences that a well-trained professional actor can do anything asked of him. He may not make principal dancer in a ballet company, but he certainly showed that he could move meaningfully on stage and that it's possible to blur the line between theatre and ballet.

And O'Donnell shone in the theatrical scenes.

"All the references are very Elizabethan," he says.

"For me, what's important are the differences between the comic roles Shakespeare wrote for William Kempe - the buffoon roles, and for Robert Armin, the courtly wit or wise fool roles," adds Alexander.

"Bottom was the one of last purely comic roles he wrote for Kempe while Falstaff was the first for Armin. The differences in humour are obvious. Bottom is a loveable person but a natural fool: he's unaware of what's going on around him and his personality is limited. He's funny because of what he is."

"You can also notice the differences [between these two types of comic roles] in the language," says O'Donnell. "Bottom gives you more scope for physical comedy, whereas more intellectual dexterity is required for Touchstone and the Fool."

"For this production, we spoke a lot about the fact that we're performing for a ballet audience whose first language is not English. It's completely unknown territory. It's important that the audience gets the basic idea of who these people are," adds Alexander.

"So, we have made some of the comedies [in "Dream"] very physical," says O'Donnell.

Our interview ends with the two giving their views on the current state of Shakespeare's theatre.

"A lot of what he spoke about in his plays is still relevant today," says O'Donnell.

"Shakespeare invented something that had never been done before," adds Alexander.

"Unlike the Greek and Medieval dramas, he was creating plays that dealt with human psychology, and the audience could recognise themselves in the characters. That changed people."

O'Donnell offers advice to young actors performing Shakespeare, "The language is the key. Don't chop off the verses - there are clues in them. Don't ignore the language, don't be lazy with it, it's a very muscular language. I don't mean you have to be grand with it, but don't rush through it. I think since the introduction of 'The Method' [school of acting], people have tended to regard the language less. You can't do that with Shakespeare."

Alexander agrees. "Method acting was based on the idea that language always had subtext for its context. But Shakespeare was putting meanings into the words. That may sound a little pompous. But you shouldn't ask 'What can I do to Shakespeare?' You should ask, 'What is Shakespeare doing to me?'"

Alexander also offers his views on contemporary staging of Shakespeare, "I don't think 'reinterpretation' is what you have to do. I think you have to 'reveal' Shakespeare. If 'reinterpretation' means you're putting it in a different social context, that's fine. But it has to do with revealing what the play is in the first place."

Pawit Mahasarinand

 The Nation

The writer can be contacted at Pawit.M@chula.ac.th