Today’s Date: 7/3/23
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
Today the campers were in the playhouse for rehearsal! Because Mondays and Tuesdays are designated for playhouse rehearsal time, the campers were able to practice in the space. Kaley, our wonderful fight choreographer, was able to block all the fight scenes in the play! The first one was the fight in the middle of act five. This fight consists of Octavius (Zyir) and Antony (JD) killing the soldiers of Brutus (Isabella P.) and Cassius’ (Pheonix) armies. This fight ends up with most of the cast lying dead on stage. While these fights were happening, we ran Cassius’ (Pheonix) death scene with Titinius (Pax) and Pindarus (Sanchez). Moving on, we ran both Cassius and Titinius’ death scenes with Kaley, making sure that the fight choreography was well done. As this happened, Octavius (Zyir), Lepidus (James), and Antony (JD) worked on their small scene in act four, scene one. We worked upstairs on Brutus’ (Isabella P.) death scene, in which Caesar (Marcos) enters as a ghost. To end off, we worked on the Caesar death scene again in the space (picture of the day), which I think caused a lot more comfort with the scene.
Quick and Quotable
- From the play We established a tension between Mark Antony (JD) and Lepidus (James). This tension is a small addition to the scene but improves the comedy of the lines.
- From the director Natasia directed Brutus to be let down to the ground gently by Caesar’s ghost. This directly mirrors how Brutus lets Caesar down to the ground slowly in act three.
- From the cast The campers are realizing that they all have moments of violence in the play. I think that working with Kaley was extremely fun for them today.
Production Insights
We have, more or less, blocked the entire play. Except for some smaller scenes that must be tidied up, there is an outline for the whole production. This means that our scene work and acting work are going to be the center of our next few rehearsals. We are waiting on confirmation to begin fitting costumes as well, so hopefully, in the next couple of days, the campers will have an idea of what they are wearing. I think that the readers here will hopefully receive a sneak peek of these costumes in tomorrow’s picture of the day. As I said earlier last week, this play has almost everyone on stage throughout almost the whole play. I just want to hammer this home because it outlines the true work and responsibility that these campers are capable of. Do not underestimate how your friends and children have grown and taken initiative at Shakespeare Camp.