Caesar can’t come to the phone right now! | American Shakespeare Center

Today’s Date: 7/1/23

Show Title: JULIUS CAESAR

Director: Natasia Reinhardt

Staff Crew: Assistant Directors: Cole Metz and Liv Meredith. Dramaturg: Eli Dietrich. Stage Manager: Lillian Malone.

What we did

Acting teacher Michael Blackwood took Portia (Jime), Calphurnia (Carson), and Caska (Archer) to work on their acting choices. Michael used many techniques to inspire the campers to make choices. One of his methods was to ask them to say, “You see?” after every line. What this caused the actors to think about was their intention and application of voice quality in these scenes. While Michael did this, Natasia worked on revising and blocking acts two and three fully. This meant that at the end of rehearsal, we were able to fully rehearse both of those acts! This is super impressive and important because act three is the centerpiece of the play (Caesar dies in that act; spoiler warning). In the end, we ran the camp song a couple of times and worked out some ideas of what it may look like. I would elaborate, but you, gracious readers, will have to wait until the performance on the 16th to hear our wonderful song.

Quick and Quotable

From the play Michael made an important observation that Portia is not angry, exactly, at Brutus. This allowed Jime to make some wonderful choices, making the character more human-like.

From the director Natasia is working on making the mob scene in act three into a very ruckus scene. This noise has been delegated really well, which has the impressive effect of both being able to hear the speaking actors while also feeling like the space is alive.

From the cast THE CAMP SONG IS SO COOL! I cannot wait for readers to watch our show, if not to see the wonderfully creative ideas the campers have had about our song.

Production Insights

As well as using other teaching techniques, Michael was essential in having the actors search for responses from their scene partners. For example, during Jime’s Portia scene, he had the stand-in for Brutus to turn away from her and not make eye contact. This choice allowed Portia to really seem desperate in her attempts. Michael working with the actors to draw intention from their words will help us make the playfully comprehensive in literary understandability. For example, Archer’s scene as Caska was worked. Making Caska more out of breath and exasperated really influenced his voice quality positively. I can’t wait to see these scenes put up in the playhouse at next Monday’s rehearsal.

Eli Dietrich

Eli is the dramaturgy mentor for Julius Caesar. In his senior year of college at UNC-Chapel Hill, Eli's studies have been focused solely on early modern European drama, and he is going to graduate next spring with a major in English and two minors in early modern history and drama. His goal is to eventually become an English professor and spread the period's wonders to all. It is exciting to be working on this show, and he hopes that those who keep up to date with this wonderful blog will enjoy the connection and core experiences being made at rehearsal. It is the job of every actor in this show to find themselves within the lines of Shakespeare, and the hope is that parents and friends reading along will also end up being touched by the lines and ideas which Julius Caesar brings up.