The Tragedy of King Lear Assistant Stage Manager
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Production Crew Technical Director .......................................................................Larry Stahl The Tragedy of King Lear Assistant Stage Manager......................................................Chastain Shenk By William Shakespeare Assistant Stage Manager.............................................................Alex Sparco Master Electrician....................................................................Lauren Tucker Costume Assistants.........................................................Nicole Capobianco Katie Helm Fight choreographer Costumes Angela Pesi Lewis Shaw Paul R. Foltz Karen Switzer Maisie Theobald Properties.............................................................................Maggie McClary Assistant Properties............................................................Hilary Rosenberg Lighting design Light Board Operator .....................................................Tamayo Kamimura Joshua Schulman Sound Board Operator .........................................................Alyson Pagano Fight and Dance Captain .............................................MacKenzie Turnbull Projection Operator ......................................................................Sarah Roy Crew ..........................................................................................Ellen Dalina Score and sound composition Program .........................................................................Maegan Clearwood John Leupold, Jon McCullom and Ken Schweitzer Publicity .....................................................................................Alex Sparco House Manager ........................................................................Marley Kabin Acknowledgments The production team would like to extend its gratitude to: Dramaturg Stage Manager The students in ENG/DRA King Lear: Text and Production course, co-taught by Dr. Maegan Clearwood Kathryn Moncrief, Dr. Jason Rubin and Professor Timothy Maloney. A special thanks (in partial fulfillment of her Patrick Derrickson to those students and non-actors who contributed in and out of the classroom, espe- Senior Capstone Experience) cially Shannon Kirby and Cristal Wright for their filming and photography. The guest speakers who hosted lectures, workshops and in-class discussions throughout the semester: Drama Professor Dale Daigle Chas Libretto ‘06 and Psittacus Productions Directed and designed by Dr. Barbara Mowat, whose visit was sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Commitee Jason Rubin Dr. Elizabeth Harvey, whose visit is co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Commitee and the Departments of Art and Art History The Folger Library for permission to use their text for production. Brian Palmer and the Multimedia Production Center for creating an incredible video trailer, and College Relations for promoting the production on the Washington College website and in the alumni magazine. There will be one fifteen minute intermission. Mike Kaylor and the Rose O’Neill Literary House Printing Press, for designing and There will be strobe light effects. creating a beautiful broadside print in honor of the production. The staff of The Elm,for their patience and professionalism these past few weeks Please turn off all electronic devices. -- even when their editor was going as mad as Lear himself -- and for their extensive No food or drink, except bottled water, is permitted in the theatre. coverage of the production. Dramaturg’s Note The Play On the surface, our world – a liberal arts campus, sleepy little Chestertown, the King Lear decides to abdicate and divide his kingdom between his three 21st century digital universe – seems nothing like the one over which King Lear once daughters. When, unlike her older sisters, Cordelia refuses to make a public ruled. His was a land of bloodlust and greed, where bastards and daughters could not declaration of love for her father she is disinherited. The Earl of Kent defends her inherit, pagan gods were cursed and worshiped and the clashing of swords determined and is also banished by Lear. The King of France accepts the dowerless Cordelia as worthiness. Ours is “civilized.” his Queen, leaving Goneril and Regan and their husbands to inherit the kingdom. Yet hundreds of years later, Shakespeare’s play is more popular than ever. Somehow, The bastard Edmund schemes to disinherit his legitimate brother, Edgar. He directors and performers continue to find parallels between Lear’s world and their own. The play has been particularly popular in times of conflict, when the younger convinces his father, Gloucester, that Edgar is plotting against his life. Fleeing the generation is reevaluating concepts of power and class. manhunt his father has set for him, Edgar disguises himself as the mad beggar Poor When Shakespeare wrote and staged the play in the early 17th century, England Tom. was teetering between two fundamental concepts of authority: the new monarch Kent returns, disguised as the servant Caius, to serve Lear. Goneril dismisses half King James I’s staunch belief in Divine Right of Kings and autocracy, and a younger, of Lear’s train of knights. He leaves to live with Regan. educated generation fighting for a voice. The play virtually disappeared for more At Gloucester’s house, Regan and Cornwall put Kent in the stocks, infuriating than a century, then boomed in popularity after the World Wars, when people were Lear. Regan and Goneril continue to refuse to board the King’s hundred knights. questioning what it meant to exist in a such a violent, cruel world. Peter Brook’s Lear goes out into the stormy night where he, his Fool and Kent encounter the 1962 production appeared during another period of intense conflict between two disguised Edgar. generations. He transformed King Lear into a metaphor about the destabilization of the Gloucester tries to help Lear and reveals to Edmund that he has a letter saying entire human race, a commentary on power’s enormously destructive nature. And here we are again. In only a few brief years, the world has shrunk dramatically, France is preparing to land in England. Edmund betrays his father to Regan and to the point where we can learn about and communicate with people on the opposite Cornwall, who deem him a traitor. end of the Earth in seconds. We are bombarded with pictures and stories from the Lear is secretly conveyed to Dover, where Cordelia has arrived with the French moment we check our email in the morning to our final Facebook status at night. army. Without revealing his identity, Edgar leads his father to Dover, where they Look at the news stories from the past decade alone: The “99 percent” protested meet the King. Lear and Cordelia reunite, but in the ensuing battle are captured by against economic inequality; uprisings against corrupt political regimes have become the sisters’ forces. almost commonplace since the Egyptian overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak; England now victorious, conflict among members of the court surfaces in a fifteen-year-old Malala Yousafzai’s activism for women’s rights under Taliban rule bloody climax --the sisters’ compete for Edmund’s heart, Edgar challenges his earned her the title of youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize nominee; and only weeks ago, traitorous brother, and the consequences of Lear’s earlier mistakes are fully realized. Pope Benedict XVI stepped down from his role as leader of the Catholic Church – the first to do so in nearly 600 years. “After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry,” he said -- echoing Lear’s decision to “shake all cares and business from our age, conferring them on younger strengths.” The Pope turned away from eight years of royal treatment -- a staff of cooks, housekeepers, secretaries, fine dining, a private chapel and enormous library -- because he recognized his own limitations as a ruler. Benedict’s abdication epitomizes how the 21st century world is in flux, politically, culturally and socially. Notions of status and authority are shifting at an almost terrifying speed. We are reminded again and again that “robes and furr’d gowns” continue to “hide all,” so the questions Shakespeare poses in this tragedy are as important as ever: What do we expect of a leader? What are the consequences of a leader’s abuse of power? And how can a play about the descent into nothingness help us tackle life’s greatest question: “Who is it that can tell me who I am?” -- Maegan Clearwood, Dramaturg Director’s Note Cast A play is like a building. They both are constructed and have an integral structure of components that must be put together before they can be used. Once they are up and King Lear.........................................................................Timothy Maloney running, people experience them in similar ways. When you enter a building, you navigate Goneril...................................................................................Andrea Clarke through it, ostensibly to find your destination but also to take advantage of the building’s The King’s eldest daughter function. Buildings are social organisms and promote both a feeling and thinking response Regan....................................................................................Dana Panczenko from the people who use them. Architecture, consisting of its particular design components, The King’s middle daughter tells the user how to respond to the building. The same goes