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VENGEANCE IS IN MY HEART, DEATH IN MY HAND BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE DIRECTOR ADENA JACOBS 20 years of inspiring young Australians through the greatest stories ever told. For 20 years, Foxtel’s support has brought Bell Shakespeare’s inspirational programs to students across Australia – from major cities to regional towns. COR0035_Bell_Shakespeare_FPC_A5_FA.indd 1 24/05/2019 4:03 PM It feels good to be ethical Teachers Mutual Bank is a proud supporter of Bell Shakespeare. 20 years of inspiring young Australians Globally, 128 companies were named as a 2019 World’s Most Ethical Company,1 including 5 banks. through the And we’re one of them for the 6th year in a row! greatest stories Join us^ ever told. tmbank.com.au/wme For 20 years, Foxtel’s support ^Membership is open to citizens or permanent residents of Australia who are current or retired employees of the has brought Bell Shakespeare’s Australian education sector or family members of members of the Bank. 1 The Ethisphere Institute is a global leader inspirational programs to students in defining and advancing the standards of ethical business practice. The World’s Most Ethical Company assessment is based upon the Ethisphere Institute’s Ethics Quotient (EQ) framework and honours superior achievements in transparency, across Australia – from major cities integrity, ethics and compliance. Worlds Most Ethical Companies and ‘Ethisphere’ names and marks are registered trade marks of Ethisphere LLL. www.ethisphere.com Teachers Mutual Bank Limited ABN 30 087 650 459 AFSL/Australian Credit to regional towns. Licence 238981 | 00711-CSR-0719-WME-148x210-BS-GTA 00711-CSR-0719-WME-A5-148x210-BS-GTA-1-2.indd 1 15/07/2019 9:01:58 AM COR0035_Bell_Shakespeare_FPC_A5_FA.indd 1 24/05/2019 4:03 PM 4 Bell Shakespeare WE ARE BELL SHAKESPEARE SHAKESPEARE’S WORK EXPLORES HUMAN EXPERIENCE AT ITS LIMITS. IT WAS WRITTEN TO BE PERFORMED. We ensure Shakespeare's work lives and INDIGENOUS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT breathes in theatres, schools and regional venues throughout Australia, where his words Bell Shakespeare acknowledges the people can be truly appreciated. of the land on which we rehearse and perform across Australia. We value the beauty of Shakespeare’s ideas, language and imagery. His work helps us find Titus Andronicus will be presented at Sydney modern perspectives on timeless truths. Opera House and we acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation on whose ancestral We believe Shakespeare and other great works lands Sydney Opera House sits. are not stuck in the past. They are the lens through which we can explore and question The First Peoples of this nation expressed their the present, and imagine the future. culture through music, dance and storytelling, and it is a privilege to continue a tradition of These plays are not static. They’re constantly storytelling and performance in this country. helping us make sense of who we are, where we’ve been, and where we’re going. And we’re We acknowledge custodians and elders, past not static either. and present, and pay respect to the cultural authority and traditions of this land. We’ve been travelling the country for more than 28 years, bringing classic theatre to Australia, looking for new ways to inspire, imagine and ignite. Shakespeare and the other classic plays we present challenge our beliefs and urge us to see ourselves in a new light. Their ability to discover the things that make us human inspires us to make work that challenges preconceptions and encourages new interpretations and contemporary parallels — work that speaks to every age. Titus Andronicus 5 WELCOME It is our pleasure to welcome you to one of nature of human civilisation and who questions the most bold and experimental productions how we might break destructive cycles of revenge Bell Shakespeare has ever staged, and violence. It has been a privilege to work Titus Andronicus. with Adena and the talented group of artists she has assembled to bring this audacious While there are some of Shakespeare's works interpretation of Titus Andronicus to life. that are programmed with regularity, there are others that we can only stage when the time is We thank our government and corporate right and the creative team around it is perfect. partners, our many generous trusts and Titus Andronicus is one of the those plays foundations, and our donors who together and Adena Jacobs is the only director we help us take our productions and education could imagine bringing this play to life for programs into theatres, schools and contemporary audiences. communities nationwide. Titus Andronicus is one of Shakespeare’s earlier We also thank you — our audience — for works, thought to have been written around joining us in the theatre to experience this 1593–1594. It is undoubtedly his most confronting bold new production. play, delving into unimaginable horrors and with wretched violence, revenge and chaos at its heart. In this production, Adena presents a bleak, dehumanised landscape; a nightmare of a society in crisis, where cycles of vengeance fuelled by grief, trauma and terror perpetuate across generations. Shakespeare’s works are not an end in themselves but are a vehicle through which we can interrogate society and ourselves. We invite you to explore this play through the eyes of a Gill Perkins Peter Evans director who wishes to comment on the darker Executive Director Artistic Director 6 Bell Shakespeare SYNOPSIS With 21 of his children left dead after a decade Lavinia’s betrothed Bassianus and to attack Lavinia. on the battleground, Titus returns home to Rome. Aaron then frames Titus’ sons for the crimes. He brings Tamora, Queen of the Goths; her lover, Aaron; and her three sons as prisoners of war. Lavinia is discovered mutilated and cannot Titus sacrifices Tamora’s eldest son in honour identify her attackers. Titus’ sons are imprisoned of his dead sons, and she swears vengeance. and Aaron tricks Titus into believing they will be released if he cuts off his hand. Titus sacrifices After their father’s death, brothers Saturninus and his arm; but Aaron lied, and Titus’ sons are killed. Bassianus vie for the title of Emperor. Yet, citizens of Rome want Titus to be ruler. Titus refuses and Titus captures Tamora’s sons and kills them. bestows the title upon Saturninus. Saturninus Next evening Titus hosts a grand feast and kills declares his desire to marry Titus’ daughter, Lavinia. Tamora questions where her sons are, and Lavinia, but when he discovers Lavinia does Titus tells her they are baked in the pie she just ate. not want to marry him, he weds Tamora instead. Titus then kills Tamora. Saturninus exacts revenge and stabs Titus but is then killed by Titus’ only Meanwhile, Aaron, Tamora’s lover, plans to exact surviving son Lucius. Aaron is sentenced to death. Tamora’s revenge on Titus. Aaron manipulates Tamora’s sons Chiron and Demetrius to murder Titus Andronicus 7 COMPANY LIST VENGEANCE IS IN MY HEART, DEATH IN MY HAND — Act 2, Scene 3 CAST CREW Tamora Melita Jurisic Stage Manager Sara Holt Aaron Tariro Mavondo Assistant Stage Manager Ruth Hollows Titus Andronicus Jane Montgomery Griffiths Head Electrician Nick Toll Lavinia, Ensemble Jayna Patel Head Mechanist Bob Laverick Marcus, Bassianus, Ensemble Josh Price Head of Audio & AV Peter Doggart Mutius, Demetrius, Ensemble Tony Ray Ray Head of Costume Hannah Lobelson Saturninus, Ensemble Daniel Schlusser Costume Cutter Robyn Fruend Lucius, Chiron, Ensemble Grace Truman Costume Assistant Brooke Cooper-Scott Clown Catherine Văn-Davies Dresser Brooke Cooper-Scott Production Assistant Paisley Williams CREATIVE TEAM Directing Secondment Claudia Osborne Lighting Design Secondment Finn Appleton Director Adena Jacobs Directing Observer Sarah Vickery Designer Eugyeene Teh Directing Observer Danielle Maas Lighting & Projection Designer Verity Hampson Composer & Sound Designer Max Lyandvert Set built by Sydney Theatre Company Movement Director Danielle Micich Lighting supplied by Chameleon Touring Systems Voice & Text Coach Jess Chambers Costume props and Prosthetic Make up Effects Dramaturg Aaron Orzech by Paul Katte and Nick Nicolaou of Make-up Effects Group PHOTOGRAPHY Campaign imagery by Zan Wimberley Rehearsal imagery by Brett Boardman Titus Andronicus 9 NOTE FROM DIRECTOR ADENA JACOBS O, WHY SHOULD WRATH BE MUTE, AND FURY DUMB? — Act 5, Scene 3 Dear Children, Their fantasies and terrors, their visions, their futures? The belief that we are doomed to We are sorry for all these stories where you get repeat cycles of violence, is a patriarchal one. chopped into pieces, and made into pies, frozen For centuries, this myth has provided us with in towers and eaten by wolves, chased through an excuse for even more trauma and bloodshed. dark forests, and married to beasts. Burnt and It allows us to say — we cannot help it. It is in our baked, slaughtered and raped. Stories like the DNA and our history, preordained from birth. one you are about to see, where parents swallow and kill and then hand you the knife. Where a girl This production queers and re-dreams gets torn into pieces, a hole for a mouth, her Shakespeare’s play, as an attempt to x-ray our face no longer a face. Stories which turn rape relationship with violence, written on the body into metaphor, violence into poetry. Which tell and transferred through history. Bodies and you that the world was always this way and will voices, usually at the margins of the play are at continue to be. That our violence becomes the centre of our exploration. Through this lens your violence. Our pain becomes your pain. we enter the brutal and shell-shocked landscape Our nightmares; your nightmares. of Titus Andronicus, trying to comprehend and re-construct the pieces of a world torn apart.

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