Thursday, November 21, 1996
UCLA students take on the challenge of doing a play in repertory
with their production of ‘Twelfth Night,’ setting Shakespeare’s
famous comedy in the 1930s.By Stephanie Sheh
Daily Bruin Contributor
omplete with love, sword fights and iambic pentameter, "Twelfth
Night" is in some ways quintessential William Shakespeare. However,
this time music, dancing, chandeliers and bow ties are also
present. This time Shakespeare’s "Twelfth Night" is set in the
’30s.
"Twelfth Night," a play about shipwrecked twins, mistaken
identity and everyone’s search for love, opens under the direction
of UCLA graduate Kent Gash, Friday at 8 p.m. in Macgowan Hall.
"Twelfth Night" will be performed in repertory with "The Rover" by
the third-year MFA acting class of the School of Theater, Film and
Television.
A repertory is when the same group of actors work on more than
one play simultaneously. They rehearse both plays during a certain
amount of time. The students will perform both "The Rover" and
"Twelfth Night" during the same run, starting with "The Rover"
tonight and alternating different plays for the following
performances.
This is not the first repertory that these students have done.
Mel Shapiro, head of the acting department, makes sure that the
actors go through repertory training. However, despite past
experiences, doing a repertory is still extremely difficult
work.
"My one qualm is that as a result I always feel like I don’t get
to give one play 100 percent of myself as an actor," says Regina
McMahon, who plays Viola, a daughter from a wealthy family who,
after being shipwrecked, decides to pose as a boy in order to work
as a servant. "It’s different to walk away from a play saying I
gave everything I could, but to be able to say I wish I could have
given everything I could is … you just can’t give 100 percent
because 50 percent of it has got to go to another show. That’s the
one thing that bugs me about the rep, but it’s awful good
training."
What makes this production unique is not that it is done in a
repertory, but that it is a Shakespearean play set in the 1930s.
The text, for the most part, remains the same, but this version of
"Twelfth Night" seems more like an American musical. The cast
includes a chorus of dancers and characters in the play .
"I think it works," says Gena Nichols, who plays Feste, the
ever-present joker. "I think it will work for any Shakespearean
play as long as you understand what the kernel of the story is and
as long as you tell it. Kent is being very sure that we all
understand what the characters are about, the story they’re trying
to relate and how some of it still applies to any period that it’s
set in."
Gash had many reasons for setting the play in the 1930s. The
’30s were a rich period in American comedy known for such
performers as the Marx Brothers, W.C. Fields and Charlie Chaplin.
In Gash’s opinion "Twelfth Night" is the greatest of Shakespeare’s
comedies.
Another reason for placing the Bard’s greatest comedy in the
’30s involves Viola’s cross-dressing stint as a male servant.
"I chose the ’30s, because in 1930 Marlene Dietrich wore a
tuxedo in ‘Morocco’ and nothing was ever really the same," Gash
says. "There’s great deal of androgyny in a lot of the popular
culture of the ’30s (that is) incredibly romantic. A big part of
that romance was sort of heightening of the gender roles and gender
roles are exactly what are being tweaked, flipped and played within
the play."
Putting "Twelfth Night" into the 1930s was Gash’s idea. However,
the students seem very excited by it. They are equally excited
about Gash, as a director.
"Kent Gash, the guy who directed this, is amazing, because he’s
an actor too, he understands the strains and stress that we’re
going through," McMahon says. "This is not the only thing we’re
doing in school. There are other classes that we still have to take
and he understands what we’re going through and just really makes
you feel like you’re the best thing since sliced bread."
"He’s just so supportive. I think that if he hadn’t been the way
he is throughout this whole process, I think we would’ve either
killed all 15 of us in our class or I would have dropped out of
school," McMahon confesses.
As a director, Gash loves his actors and reciprocates the
affection that his actors have for him.
"I really love them as a group and I admire their certain
courage of seeming ceaseless will and energy, because I’ve been
asking them to do a lot of crazy things," Gash says.
"I’m pretty demanding, because I don’t approach it like, ‘Well,
it’s a student production so you’re only this good. That’s OK
…that’s bullshit!’ I’m sorry. Uh uh. No, no. If it’s going to
have my name on it and we’re going to do it, we’re going to do the
best ‘Twelfth Night’ that we can possibly do and hopefully the best
‘Twelfth Night’ that anybody can ever see. If we’re not going to
set out to do that then let’s just all go home," he says.
Nichols says that it is not just Gash’s attitude that has been
encouraging. She also likes the way he directs. "He’s very
supportive and he’s wonderful in the way that he will plan the
scene for whatever he wants you to do in a particular scene for a
particular character, and he lets you fertilize it and nurture it
until it blossoms into something wonderful," she says.
Gash also requested that, during the production, his students
not see Trevor Nunn’s film version of "Twelfth Night" that is
currently out in theaters. Gash says that friends have told him
that the movie has rearranged some scenes and that the text "has
been cut like mad." For the same reasons he forbids his actors see
the movie, Gash himself has not seen the film.
"A movie is a really powerful thing. It’s an image that’s 40
some odd feet high … it’s just a completely different medium and
I didn’t want their performances of their work on this production
influenced, because what they did in the film is radically
different from what I’m doing, because what we’re doing with the
production is radically different from anybody’s production," Gash
says.
Nichols has followed her director’s orders and not gone near the
film, and she agrees with Gash’s reasoning. "It affects your
performance. As we’re trying to come up with our own
characterizations and our own way we want to tell the story, I
think it could be jaded by seeing Trevor Nunn’s production," she
says.
McMahon also points out that the mere nature of film is
different from that of the stage.
"You don’t need an audience for film. As long as someone’s in
that booth pushing play … you can have one person in there
watching with his popcorn saying ‘Oh this is pretty good," but
without the audience there is no theater," she says.
"That’s the beauty of live theater," Nichols adds. "Every night
you have a different audience, so you walk into a different energy
when you get on that stage, because (theater) is a union of the
audience and the people on stage performing and having fun for two
or three hours."
The intimate, live experience makes each theatrical experience
unique from another. Theater-goers can go see the same show night
after night and each performance will be different. This immediate
experience is one of the reasons Gash gives to encourage students
to come see the show.
"They should come see it because it’s a live theatrical
experience that’s unlike any they will ever see in a movie house.
It’s live. It’s the real thing," Gash says. "They should also come
see it now so that they can see these actors at the low low price
of a ticket at UCLA, because once these people are on Broadway and
they have to pay $75 a ticket to sit down and watch them on a
Saturday night, they’ll be saying ‘Oooh, I wish I had gone to see
them in ‘Twelfth Night.’"
THEATER: UCLA will present "Twelfth Night" on various dates and
times starting Friday through Dec. 7 at the Little Theater, in
Macgowan Hall on campus. Tickets are $12; $9 for senior citizens,
UCLA faculty and staff; $6 for students. For TIX call (310)
825-2101.
BAHMAN FARAHDEL
Nick Freeman (kneeling), and Paul Katani perform in "Twelfth
Night," presented by the School of Theatre, Film and
Television.SHAWN LAKSMI
Regina McMahon plays a Marlene Dietrich-style Viola in "Twelfth
Night."