Why Shakespeare? Why Now?
Just like Hamlet’s famous line: “To be or not to be,/ That is the question,” what people have mainly been asking me is “Why Shakespeare?” and more importantly, “Why now?”
The first of those questions is more complex to answer, so I will attempt that later. But to the second question: Why do I think we need Shakespeare now more than ever? Well, to that point, why not now? Or, if not now, then when? Shakespeare has never really been on a schedule, and after over 400 years, I don’t think he ever plans on being on one. He is timeless and the people he wrote about are timeless. The themes he wrote about can still be seen in the world today, and we still use the language that he contributed to daily. Ever hear a singer or rapper talk about their “swag” or “swagger”? That’s Shakespeare. Ever been “tounge-tied”? That’s Shakespeare. He is even one of the earliest inventors of the Your Momma joke: “Villain, I have done thy mother!” ~Titus Andronicus. He found new vehicles of communication through different words, and evolved the English language to much of what we know today, and we still evolve this language daily. As a public middle school teacher, I literally have to Google some of the things my students say. Words like “cap,” “cringe,” “rizz,” etc. are all foreign to me, as I am sure Shakespeare is like a foreign language to any middle schooler.
So when it comes to the question “Why now?” the very plain and simple answer is “Why not now?” What should we wait for, and how would holding on to some 400 plus year old text benefit anyone? But now, let’s backtrack to the first question, “Why Shakespeare?” This is a question that I could talk about for days.
Growing up and for most of my college career, I always felt like Shakespeare was untouchable, at least to me. I felt like he was something that was so revered and sacred, almost like he was hiding behind this glass box inside a museum, and you could only reach him if you wore those special little white gloves so as not to damage it. In my mind there was a right way and a wrong way to do Shakespeare. And why wouldn’t I think that? The way Shakespeare was taught to me was that he needed to be read and analyzed and the Iambic Pentameter needed to be galloped out along the stage and “WHAT DOES THE METER TELL YOU?!”… Well I simply didn’t know. These characters didn’t feel like characters, they felt like legends, and a lot of pressure was put on me as a young theatre artist to “get it right” when it came to Shakespeare. Because who wouldn’t want to play those iconic roles like Lady M, Desdemona, Ophelia, Beatrice, and so many other of his great roles. Yet, every time I tried, I was told, “No, it’s like this,” or “No, it’s not de DUM on this line, it’s DUM de,” and in my head I was shouting, “WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?!” all while hiding my anxiety about it the whole time and trying to learn through cryptic teachers’ messages.
Then I went to England, and I saw Shakespeare at the Globe, first hand. It was a production of Midsummer in 2009 ish. I remember thinking to myself, “Wow, Demetrius and Lysander really do hate each other over Hermia,” “Helena really is distraught over her rejection,” “Wow, that was a dirty joke, where did that come from?” And all of a sudden, these characters became relatable, they became emotional, they became human for me. And I decided, right then, that I was going to face this Shakespeare head on, and I was going to do it scared.
It didn’t come easily, and there were many bumps along the road, but a few years later I found myself auditioning for East 15 Acting in England. I went in to the audition thinking that I had graduated three years prior, hadn’t done any acting since graduating, I was out of practice, so there was no way I would ever get in to this school. And I just went to have fun. I got an email 2 days after my audition with an offer for a spot in the MFA/MA class. Not only was I headed to England, but my school did an internship with the Globe theatre where we were going to work with their voice and movement teachers, their directors, and the one and only Giles Block, Master of Text at the Globe. Not only that, but the teachers at the school prepared us in the best ways because they all had worked with Shakespeare. My first term teacher, Sonia Ritter, worked with the RSC and the Globe theatre for over a decade, the headmaster of the school has written several textbooks on how to act Shakespeare, just to name a few of the things they have done.
The experience at the Globe was fantastical, and cold, as it was December in England. We performed for a small audience, mainly our classmates and teachers, and had the time of our lives. And in two short years, I was home. And I found out that not only do we teach Shakespeare differently than they do in England, we also don’t really do much of him in the theatre world. Sure, we learn about him in English class, and we may do a monologue here or there in theatre class, but the only productions that are few and far between of his works are mainly college. I graduated from East 15 in 2016, and was cast as Beatrice in 2018 at a local community theatre company. We sold out an entire three week run. It wasn’t until 2023, 5 years later, that I was invited to co-direct Romeo & Juliet, in which the theatre sold over 1,000 tickets across only 4 shows. What I realized was that we had found the humanity. We had found the emotion. We had found what makes these characters people, and the audience felt that.
So, why Shakespeare? Because he encapsulates the human experience so efficiently, so effortlessly, and so empathetically through timeless themes that we in the world are still experiencing today. We are not the gatekeepers of Shakespeare. He is not behind some glass box in a museum. He is breathing through each and every human experience on this earth. And we need to celebrate that.
I’ll leave you with this line from Measure for Measure. It resonates with me and my experience with Shakespeare and it’s almost like he’s giving me a small piece of advice, and I’d like to share that little nugget of wisdom.
“Our doubts are traitors, And make us lose the good we oft might win, By fearing to attempt.” ~ Lucio
My version of this line, in plain English is, “I’m going to do it, and I’m going to do it scared.”
