Tuesday July 17th
Show Title: Pericles, Prince of Tyre
Director: Marshall B Garrett
Assistant Directors: Chase O’Neill and Olivia Pedigo
Production Intern: Abraham Joyner-Meyers
Rehearsal Room: Grafton
What we did
Rehearsal began today with a viewpoints exercises. Marshall led the cast through an exploration of four words: “paradise,” “stink,” “journey,” and “home.” The four words led us into our first text work, digging into the first scenes of the play. As we resolved questions, we started world building by discussing the values of each world (Antioch: “pride,” Tyre: “security”), and then building tableaus of each court with their bodies. The cast dealt with the status of characters and the tone of the place. Tomorrow is lake day, a well earned rest, but on Thursday we’ll dive back into the text and begin working on one of my favorite parts of the show: music.
Quick and Quotable
From the play
LEONINE: These rogueing thieves serve the great Pyrato Valdes!
[to which Marshall responded: “He’s the Dread Pirate Roberts. It’s canon.”]
From the director
MARSHALL: Shakeskins! Wait no! Wilkspeare is better.
[Shakespeare and Wilkins wrote Pericles collaboratively.]
MARSHALL: To “decide” means to kill every other option. Like fratricide and suicide. I don’t want to kill all our possibilities. Keep playing around!
From the cast
RDA CHASE: The PeriPeople (cast) just told me they’re all now the PeriClique.
Production Insights
After each scene the we worked through today, the cast created tv-episode names for the sections, including “The Song of Antioch,” “The Answer is Incest,” “Don’t Flatter He’s Mine,” “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry.”
Abraham Joyner-Meyers
Abraham Joyner-Meyers is a fiddler, a juggler, and a huge Shakespeare nerd. He completed watching the Shakespearean canon in the fall after seeing ASC’s production of The Fall of King Henry (Henry VI, Part 3). His passion for the Bard also led him to attend ASCTC for two summers, where he acted in Two Gentleman of Verona and Much Ado About Nothing. When Abe is not furiously reading, seeing, or acting in Shakespeare plays, he’ll often be found teaching himself to play new instruments, dancing at contras and with Morris teams, or training with his school archery team. He just completed his freshman year in the dual degree program between Harvard University and Berklee College of Music.