{"id":101666,"date":"2015-04-23T10:03:18","date_gmt":"2015-04-23T14:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=101666"},"modified":"2015-05-05T09:55:35","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T13:55:35","slug":"staging-magic-a-midsummer-nights-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2015\/04\/staging-magic-a-midsummer-nights-dream\/","title":{"rendered":"Staging Magic: A Midsummer Night’s Dream"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"From<\/a>
From left, Kent Coleman \u201917 (SFA) (Peaseblossom), Michael Patrick Kane (Nick Bottom), and MFA candidate Natalia Cuevas (Titania) in Connecticut Repertory Theatre\u2019s production of Shakespeare\u2019s ‘A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.’ (Gerry Goodstein for UConn)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Shakespeare\u2019s comedy \u201cA Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream,\u201d which opens today as the final production of the spring season of the Connecticut Repertory Theatre, is among the Bard\u2019s most popular works. But it was not always so revered.<\/p>\n

The play, written circa 1590, is a comedy of mistaken love set in a forest with fairies, magic spells, and people transforming into animals. Almost a century later, during The Restoration of the English monarchy, production of the play fell out of favor.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was seen as frivolous and silly,\u201d says Lindsay Cummings, assistant professor of theatre studies in the School of Fine Arts. \u201cIt was also too ensemble driven. There was no star role in a period where you had the rise of actor\/manager-driven companies. No one wants to pick this play because it\u2019s hard to say: who\u2019s the starring character?\u201d<\/p>\n

However, by the dawn of the 19th century, she says, the rise of the Romantic Movement in literature embraced the themes of \u201cA Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.\u201d At the same time, the roles of both director and set designer begin to rise in the theater.<\/p>\n

\"From<\/a>
From left, MFA acting candidates Michael Bobenhausen (Lysander), Arlene Bozich (Helena), and Bryce Wood (Demetrius) in the Connecticut Repertory Theatre\u2019s production of Shakespeare\u2019s ‘A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.’ (Gerry Goodstein for UConn)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWhen the play becomes popular again, it\u2019s both thematically interesting to people and the early new productions were clearly less about starring roles and more about this new thing, which is the director\u2019s vision or a design,\u201d Cummings says. \u201cThat\u2019s where this play latched on and became popular, because it is theatrical; it is spectacular. Once we stop doing the bare Shakespearian stage, we can embrace that spectacle. Suddenly it\u2019s really exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

The resurgence of interest in the comedy resulted in adaptations of \u201cMidsummer\u201d in several forms, as a musical, operetta, opera, and ballet. As technology advanced, the production moved from the stage to film and television, with the ongoing challenge of creating new ways to visualize the mystery and magic of the forest and its inhabitants, particularly the imaginative fairies.<\/p>\n

\"From<\/a>
From left, Gabriel Aprea \u201915 (SFA) (Puck), MFA acting candidate Curtis Longfellow (Oberon), Conor Donnally \u201915 (SFA) (Puck), and Scott Redmond \u201917 (SFA) (Puck) cause trouble in the Connecticut Repertory Theatre\u2019s production of Shakespeare\u2019s ‘A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.’ (Gerry Goodstein for UConn)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cummings notes that one of the early innovators was the 1856 Charles Kean production that had the character Puck arrive on stage by appearing on the cap of a mushroom rising from the stage floor. At the turn of the century, Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree created a forest on stage with full trees, real grass, and live rabbits. In the 20th century, the award-winning director Peter Brook presented a spare, white box as the setting and had actors doing circus moves to create theatrical magic.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about how we make that magic new and exciting,\u201d she says. \u201cThat\u2019s where people have the most fun with this show. It\u2019s a show about theater. It\u2019s a play with a play in it. It\u2019s the inherent theatricality.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Director’s Vision<\/strong><\/p>\n

The CRT production is directed by Dale AJ Rose, associate artistic director at CRT and director of performance studies, who has set \u201cMidsummer\u201d at the dawn of the 20th century, as electricity began to change the world. Rose says his influences for creating the fairy world in the CRT production originate from Andrew Lang\u2019s 12-volume Fairy Books of Many Colors,<\/em> published between 1889 and 1910, and John Crowley\u2019s 1981 fantasy novel Little, Big.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI have never thought of this world as delicate, but a world that has power over the natural order of things,\u201d Rose says. \u201cIn this production I also see the industrial world as bringing about the end of the Fairy Kingdom. Once mankind finds a scientific way of producing light, the dark, which is the fairies’ world, is threatened and will bring about their demise. This does parallel the inventions of man\u00a0\u2013 seemingly for the good of mankind\u00a0\u2013 that have caused the destruction of many elements of good in the natural world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Michael Demers, CRT\u2019s master stage electrician, says creating theatrical magic on stage for any production is challenging, noting that today’s audiences arrive having seen so many special effects in films. His goal is to fulfill the director\u2019s vision.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first part is believing you can do it,\u201d Demers says of his approach to meeting the challenges. \u201cThe next thing is to go ahead and leave it open to whoever is going to come up with the right idea. Every show, we\u2019re prototyping something. I don\u2019t really worry very much if I hit it out of the park the first time. I just want to get something to have comments on quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n

In \u201cMidsummer,\u201d the changing light from the phases of the moon is symbolic and plays a role in the storyline. There are also other illuminations of trees and flowers in the forest. Demers says one of the technical decisions needed was how to accomplish the changes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are a number of ways you can do that. You can do one moon and light it in a number of ways so the light catches it, or you can have different [moons] that come in,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are all types of lighting throughout. There are glowing flowers, a tree that has lights integrated. The special effects allow for different glimpses into how things can be perceived. We use dry ice to allow for low lying fog in the forest that provides that mystery of what\u2019s under your feet.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream\u201d is at the Harriet S. Jorgensen Theatre in the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts from April 23 through May 3. For information go to the CRT website<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shakespeare’s comedy of mistaken love set in a forest with fairies, magic spells, and people transforming into animals, runs through May 3 at the Harriet Jorgensen Theatre.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":101788,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[55],"class_list":["post-101666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-07 04:41:34","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101666"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101666\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":101872,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101666\/revisions\/101872"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/101788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101666"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=101666"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=101666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}