Directing "Midsummer" Part One: Hippolyta & Hermia

What-ho and welcome to this egregious bacchanal of a segment of the audio folio known as the Electric Secrets Variety podcast.

For those who act, direct and design the works of the bard, and for as many lovers and admirers, this is Rustic Shakespeare.

SCOTT SMITH: 

And welcome in again everybody. This is Scott Leon Smith. I'm your host for Rustic Shakespeare, part of the Electric Secrets Variety podcast, and questionable British accent aside, here I am, to talk about a new play, and something that fascinates me, how Shakespeare has basically become a playground for not only actors of whatever gender, whatever race, whatever nationality, whatever ethnicity, you can cast anyone in any role.

It is a universal playground.

It is for everyone and for all time.

And what I want to talk about in the next few episodes is what I did to engage with that, when I directed a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, one of the most popular comedies.

Now obviously any Shakespeare play is going to be dated in terms of its subject matter and how women are treated especially. 

A Midsummer Night's Dream is no exception.

So you not only have to wrestle with the sexism that is inherent in a lot of Shakespeare, but you have an opportunity to not fix it, but to maybe make a little commentary on it.

I want to talk about the very first scene and how we tackle the inherent perceptions of–especially women–in Shakespeare's comedies. So let's to’t already!

If you're going to perform or direct Shakespeare in the 21st century, you do have to acknowledge how Shakespeare's texts are inherently flexible. They allow for interpretation, bold interpretation and reinterpretation. That is what keeps the plays alive after 400-some years.

If we did it the way we believed that they did it…all those years ago, it would be stale and flat.

In fact, during the 19th century there was a playwright who rewrote the ends of Shakespeare's tragedies to give them a happy ending. I guess because it was depressing enough to live in Victorian England and they needed a laugh at the end of King Lear or Macbeth or something like that.

But you are you and the 21st century is the 21st century. So, you have to engage with Shakespeare from your own experience and the experience of your actors and the designers that you're working with.

So you can have diverse casting. You don't have to pay attention to traditional gender, race, ethnic expectations. You can cast Titania as a male. You can cast Puck as male or female or non-binary or whatever you want to do.

And I find that incredibly liberating as a director because I don't have to have an idea in my mind for what I want the character to be. Somebody could still surprise me. I'm all about possibilities.

So maybe I have an idea for the characters but at the same time I'm very, very open to what my auditioners are bringing to the table. I want them to be them.

That's really another amazing thing about it. The characters are so unique the way they're written but an actor's personality can shine through those characters as well. It's almost a paradox.

But even with those more open opportunities for casting you still have to deal with the way people were viewed hundreds of years ago. And sometimes you have to make little tweaks.

But those little tweaks don't have to feel like, oh I'm being politically correct. They can actually be fun and add humor to the play, to the scene, and to the overall effect for the audience.

So again if you're not familiar with the play please go to Folger Shakespeare Library, to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and you can find synopsies and familiarize yourself with the characters I'm talking about.

When the play opens it opens with marital festivities. So there's about to be a wedding between Theseus who is the Duke of Athens who I played because I couldn't find somebody else to play Theseus and he is marrying Hippolyta. Now the background for this is that Hippolyta was taken prisoner and now Theseus is going to marry her.

Now if you know Greek mythology Theseus is the legendary hero who killed the Minotaur, the half man half bull. And Hippolyta is a warrior queen, an Amazon. She's a warrior. And if you know DC Comics you know that the character of Hippolyta is Wonder Woman's mother. Not in the Greek myth sense but in DC Comics, modern DC Comics.

So the character of Hippolyta in A Midsummer Night’s Dream is really window dressing. She barely has anything to do or anything to say. So I decided as I was blocking and thinking about these scenes that I wanted Hippolyta to do something more, to have some more important character gestures toward the other characters, have a little bit more of a say in what's happening in the world. And in the world and on stage.

So there's a habit of making this first scene very stoic and very stiff. We're all about the rules and the rules are what make Athens what it is. We've got to follow the rules. So we have Hermia who is the daughter of Egeus and she wants to marry Lysander. And Egeus her father does not want this marriage to go forward. He wants her to marry Demetrius.

But here's the thing. And this is something you have to deal with when you're doing “Midsummer” is… if Hermia doesn't follow her father's wishes. I mean this is a time when women are still seen as property of their father. If she doesn't wed Demetrius she either has to become a nun and live in chastity for the rest of her life.

Or she can be put to death.

When this comes up in the scene I have Hippolyta laugh a little bit at the ridiculousness of this.

And everybody kind of looks at her but I instructed my actors…Everybody understands what Hippolyta means. 

But we've got Egeus here…this old man who's a stickler for the rules. So we have to kind of put on a show for Egeus that you know we're taking him seriously even though this is a ridiculous thing. So we're treating the law of Athens as if this particular rule or this particular law is this ancient thing that nobody follows anymore. And maybe Egeus is very senile and doesn't really know what he's saying. But we have to keep up appearances for Egeus, so we don't cause him to get angry and do something that everybody will regret. Maybe kill his daughter in front of us or because everybody's there.

So I have Hippolyta laugh a little bit and then that prompts Theseus to take Egeus aside. And Hippolyta has a little moment with Hermia and Lysander.

I had Egeus bring in a book of Athenian law. And as he's exiting with Theseus, Hippolyta grabs the book of law out of his hand and turns to the page that has that rule on it, rips the page out and gives it to Hermia. So in essence I'm having Hippolyta say “Now you make the decision.”

You have this law in your hands. You can do what you want with this law and Hippolyta leaves after that.

So I wanted to give Hippolyta a little bit more say in what happens and it also helped me deal with this idea of a daughter being the property of her father. I took a character that was basically just window dressing, gave that character, Hippolyta, something else to do in the play.

And later I have Hermia bring the page out and tear it up and throw it away.

So any of these things that 21st century sensibilities are going to sort of raise their eyebrow at, see these things as opportunities to do something fun with the script and with the characters.

Once more what-ho! You are listening to Rustic Shakespeare. Be sure to check out the other segments in the Magnum Opus that is the Electric Secrets Variety podcast. Including Dedicated to the Craft, revealing the secrets of acting and directing. The Unforgettable Voice, where we explore the secrets of vocal performance and the iconic voices of our time.

SCOTT:

Now let's talk a little Theseus. Again Theseus is…tends to be played as very stiff, very stoic.

And we tend to take this first scene in Midsummer a little seriously. Which can help the comedy that happens later. Or I think you can use the stiffness or the mythos of these particular characters, as Shakespeare's taking two mythical characters, Theseus and Hippolyta.

And putting them in a position where they're going to marry each other.

So I thought what would be an interesting way to introduce this couple to the audience without them being so stiff and stoic. So I had the character of Philostrate, who is a servant, and is seen periodically throughout the play.

I opened the play with Philostrate teaching Theseus and Hippolyta their wedding dance.

And the way I justified this was that Theseus and Hippolyta are both warriors. 

What if Theseus and Hippolyta never had contact with courtly graces, right? They're both warriors. They both fight and go on adventures. When would they ever have time to learn how to ballroom dance or something like that?

So I had Philostrate keeping rhythm with her hands as she taught us how to dance.

And we were doing this first scene where Theseus is talking to Hippolyta: 

“Now fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour draws on apace, four happy days bringing another moon.”

So something is happening as we are engaged in this dialogue. We're learning how to ballroom dance. And when we start dancing, we're completely inept at it, because we're warriors…our steps are too heavy. We're too clumsy with the steps.

You have to find a way to humanize those characters because that is what is going to draw in a 21st century audience.

And as this developed, we started layering on more stuff. What if Theseus and Hippolyta are terrible dancers, but they think they're great? So Theseus is dancing is like, “oh, I'm dancing now. Look at me. I do everything well because I'm a hero and a hero never does anything badly.” So he doesn't see that he's a terrible dancer.

Now you might be saying, “Scott, where is the justification for these choices in the actual text in the actual dialogue?”

Well, Theseus has a speech. At the end of the speech, he says, “Hippolyta, I wooed thee with my sword and won thy love doing the injuries, but I will wed thee in another key with pomp, with triumph and with reveling.”

So I thought to myself, OK, I have textual precedent to say these two are warriors. “I wooed thee with my sword and I won thy love doing the injuries.” So I can even imagine that they fight with swords like they practice with each other. They practice their sword fighting skills.

And even in the curtain call, that's how I brought Theseus and Hippolyta out for their bow.

They were fighting with swords. And the last bit of that speech,” I will wed thee in another key with pomp, with triumph and with reveling.”

I got a sense as I was reading that and preparing the script that this is a key that he's not used to. But he's willing to try. He's willing to say, OK, I won't– We won't do the warrior thing. We'll do pomp. We'll do triumph. We'll do things that we don't normally do. They don't normally dance.

So that gives me a precedent to explore, at least, not, you know, not thinking this is the correct way to stage something, but to at least explore something that could be fun and more meaningful to a 21st century audience than the stoicism of Athenian rulers and the inflexibility of Athenian law.

I can make these people a little bit more human and a little bit more fun and interesting and compelling than people who are just completely inflexible.

And that also provides a good dynamic because we already have this inflexible character in Egeus.Hermia’s  father who wants her to marry Demetrius. He wants to follow Athenian law to the letter. So you always need to find opportunities where you can create dynamics and conflict and tension between characters.

Now, you could still play it as Egeus, and Theseus, and Hippolyta against Hermia, like kind of ganging up on Hermia.

I think about Hero in Much Ado About Nothing, how everybody turns on her just because there's a suspicion that she's a loose woman…just because one of the nobles said she was. Everybody turns on her, even her own father. 

So I think about those things too. I think about, okay, I don't want people ganging up on Hermia. I want Hermya to be a stronger character because 21st century women are going to identify that

more than they would with a more immature version of Hermia who is just begging her daddy not to marry her off to Demetrius.

The women, especially in the comedies, are the smartest characters in the play. So I wanted to give Hermia an opportunity to stand up for herself and give Lysander an opportunity to stand up for his love for her.

And then that became the tension and the conflict between them and Egeus, the stickler for the law, the stoic, and then some added conflict and tension with Hippolyta's attitude toward the law.

I had her laugh and Theseus being, you know, I just, I'm just trying to get married here. I'm planning my wedding and now I have to deal with this.

So humanity is all about all these different agendas coming together in conflict. So the more agendas you create between your characters, the more conflict and drama you're going to have.

You just have to make sure it's not confusing. So that was part of the rehearsal process was making sure everything was clear with all of these characters and how we were modifying them to fit a modern interpretation of this company.

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SCOTT: 

Let's go a little deeper into this idea of Hermia standing up for herself in a way that is not what might be called a traditional portrayal.

Again, Theseus in my interpretation and in my staging of this first scene is placating Egeus, trying to play the role of the good ruler who is trying to see all sides, and he starts talking to Hermia. And he wants to hear what she has to say, but he says this, he says, 

“Be advised, fair maid, to you, your father should be as a god, one that composed your beauties, yea, and one to whom you are but as a form in wax, by him imprinted and within his power to leave the figure or disfigure it.”

Now to me, he's trying to persuade her to go along with her father, but I think the words are more for her father than they are for her, your father should be as a god, and you should be by him imprinted and within his power.

So again, looking at this through a 21st century lens, you can see this as sort of a, I'm playing a scene, this is like a play within a play for Egeus.

Now when Hermia starts to really speak up for herself, she asks Theseus, what's the worst that could happen to her if she refuses to follow her father's wishes and wed Demetrius?

And she says, “I do entreat your grace to pardon me,” your grace being the Duke Theseus.

“I know not by what power I am made bold, nor how it may concern my modesty in such a presence here to plead my thoughts, but I beseech your grace that I may know the worst that may befall me in this case if I refuse to wed Demetrius.”

I love that line,” I know not by what power I am made bold.”

If this were 400 years ago and we were watching this in The Globe, it would almost be like, oh, something is possessing me to stand up for myself. I am not choosing to do this because I am a woman and I cannot choose to stand up for myself.

In a 21st century portrayal, Hermia is choosing to stand up for herself. “I know not by what power I am made bold,” it's her power, but she's not going to say that in front of Theseus or in front of her father. Because it might hurt her case or make her seem to be too bold.

Now, in this particular production, I have Theseus take the book of Athenian law from Egeus and perform Theseus's answer to Hermia as if he's reading it directly from the book of Athenian law.

So this is what awaits Hermia. Theseus says, “Either to die the death or to abjure forever the society of men.”

So become a nun or die. “Therefore, fair Hermia question your desires, know of your youth, examine well your blood, whether if you yield not to your father's choice, you can endure the livery of a nun. To live a barren sister all your life.”

All of these things, “barren sister,” never having children, all of these traditional marriage relationships are coming out in this speech. And if we play it like it's a play for Egeus, it gives Theseus a little bit more like he's trying to play for time. He's trying to get her to say, “okay, I'll go along with my dad, I'll marry this guy.” And maybe Theseus can get back to planning his wedding and deal with all this stuff later.

So once you create that idea of Theseus is a warrior first, maybe a leader second, and maybe a dancer third, you can justify all of this subtext in your actor's mind.

The actor in this case being me. So I didn't have too many arguments with myself about how I wanted to play Theseus.

But again, a 21st century young woman would hear Theseus's words “question your desires, know of your youth.” Well, what's the reaction going to be?

You know, “I'm not a girl. I'm not a baby. I know what I want. I know who my family is.” He says, “examine well your blood.” 

“I know what my family is, but I want this. I want something different than what my family wants.”

And from a 21st century perspective, that is a reasonable argument.

So then Theseus tries to counter with this metaphor. He says, “thrice blessed they that master so their blood to undergo such maiden pilgrimage. But earthly or happy is the rose distilled than that which withering on the virgin thorn grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.”

All of this sexual stuff, sexuality, you don't want to be a virgin. You don't want to..not bear children for your husband and you want to marry who your father wants you to marry.

“You want to be a good girl, don't you? You want to do all the things that are expected of a good girl.”

And Hermia's response is so great. She says, “So will I grow, so live, so die, my Lord, air, I will yield my virgin patent up unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke, my soul consents not to give sovereignty.”

I love that “yoke” like she's an animal, unwished yoke. I'm not an animal. “I'm not going to yield up my virgin patent.”

The patent is who owns this, right? “I own my virginity.” Hermia owns her own virginity, not her father, not Theseus, not Athens, not Demetrius.

She will yield her virgin patent up to whom she wants to yield it up to.

So Theseus's reaction to this, obviously, Egeus is fuming. He doesn't have too many lines, but I gave the actor playing Egeus, you know, totally react to everything she's saying.

And Theseus's reaction is, “well, take time to pause.” Okay, let's take some time with this. “And by the next new moon,” which is when he's going to marry Hippolyta, because, you know, dramatic timing, everything has to happen at a certain important time.

So on the day Theseus is to marry Hippolyta. That's the deadline. Hermia has to decide if she's going to marry Demetrius or disobey her father and either die and become a nun.

And then Demetrius speaks up for the first time. He says, “Relent, sweet Hermia, and Lysander yield thy crazed title to my certain right.”

Again, we're talking rights. Who has the right to schtupp Hermia and marry Hermia? And I love Lysander's response to Demetrius.

He says, “You have her father's love Demetrius. Let me have Hermias. Do you marry him.”

In other words, Hermia’s dad loves you so much. Why don't you marry her dad instead of her? 

And we have this great competition between the male lovers, the young boys who are, you know, sniping at each other.

And it's all over Hermia who gets Hermia. So Hermia has the power and the whole thing. She's the smartest one and she has the most power because all these men are falling over each other.

And I think that that justifies further Hippolyta's action toward Hermia to bring the book, rip the law out of the book and give it to Hermia. Okay, you've got the power now.

You can do what you want. This is my gift to you from one woman to another.

All kinds of great opportunities if you use your imagination. You can really think about these things and come up with really compelling ways to play these scenes that are 400 years old and steeped in the old attitudes toward sexuality, toward women, toward marriage, toward parents' relationship with their children, all of that stuff.

And you can make it much more relatable and compelling and interesting for a 21st century audience.

We have come to the end of this episode. Thank you so much for listening. Don't worry. We are going to delve more into A Midsummer Night's Dream in the next episode. We're going to talk about Oberon and Puck and Titania and their relationship with the lovers and with each other as we venture into the enchanted forests outside of Athens.

If you haven't yet, please check out the other segments in the Electric Secrets Variety podcast. You can find those at monstervoxroductions.com.

And if you're not familiar with A Midsummer Night's Dream, read it on Folger Shakespeare Library. There are plenty of film versions available that you can familiarize yourself with and a lot of these concepts that I'm talking about will resonate better with you if you have a good idea of how the story falls out.

Okay. May good fortune guide thee and farewell. I am Scott Leon Smith. I will see you next time.

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