What happened in Week 1?
🏁 In our first week, highlights include:
- the play as a tragic comedy and its significance in Shakespeare’s career
- Leontes sudden and irrational jealousy towards his wife, Hermione.
- the importance of pacing and punctuation in the text.
Watch the Week 1 Session!
Full transcript included at the bottom of this post.
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Total Running Time: 2:00:38
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THE SCENE
Our group will be working on Act 2, Scene 1 and Act 3, Scene 2 from Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale:
- Leontes has Hermione arrested for adultery and treason
- Hermione tries to defend herself in open court
Scenes from the Folger Shakespeare Library here and here.
The Winter’s Tale Team – we have artists in LA, San Diego, Philly, and New York!
- DIRECTOR: Geoffrey Wade
- DRAMATURG: Gideon Rappaport
- LEONTES: Christopher Guilmet
- HERMIONE: Shannone Lee Clair
- ANTIGONUS: J. Paul Nicholas
Read more about the artists here.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
One of our dramaturgs, Dr. Gideon Rappaport, has written three books on Shakespeare:
- Appreciating Shakespeare
- William Shakespeare’s Hamlet: Edited and Annotated
- Shakespeare’s Rhetorical Figures: An Outline
And there’s more!
Catch up on our other workshops featuring lots of Shakespeare scenes, from Hamlet, King Lear, Troilus and Cressida, Midsummer, As You Like It, and our Twelfth Night repertory extravaganza – all on the podcast and YouTube. If you’ve missed any presentations thus far, click here to find them all.
Click here for the transcript!
Nathan
I was just saying, I was talking to an actress who did the sessions last month, and I was saying that this whole project came out of conversations and, and I, I, I’m guessing Jeffrey was part of those in the early days of the pandemic, probably around May, 2020. And, you know, everybody was doing these livestream zoom readings of full plays and, and, and a lot of the actors that we had done a couple and, you know, was hearing that they, they weren’t very artistically rewarding that it was just, you know, there was a lot of stress to do these readings, and you’re still Zoom acting.
And it was like, well, what, what else can we do with this medium? And from those conversations came, came to this project. So, and, and Jeffrey was absolutely involved in the early days, you know, doing some scenes and thrilled, thrilled he can join us again. And as I, as I texted with Jeffrey, this is kind of the, the Jeffrey Wade reunion hour, even though Paul is not here with us, just about everybody has a connection with Jeffrey. And, and so a past life or something? No.
Geoffrey
Everybody has a very strong connect. Yes. Unusually not, not just, yeah.
Nathan
A passing through connection. Right. Yeah. So I am.
Gideon
Floating on a wave of connection right now because he just wrote to me his opinion about my book. And it was fabulous. And I’m, I’m.
Geoffrey
I, now, I now I have, I have a question. When I was working in San Francisco, my hairdresser is Gideon’s niece, not hairdresser. She worked in hair and makeup and she gave me hairs where wor which were superb. And, but she said, oh yeah, my, my, my uncle.
But she called you Giong. Is that.
Gideon
That’s the, that’s the Hebrew of Gideon.
Geoffrey
Do, do you have a preference or Gideon.
Gideon
Is fine. Gidan Gideon.
Geoffrey
Is fine. Okay. Gidon.
Gideon
Is the, the Hebrew pronunciation. And my family converted it to something much more informal. And so, yeah, no, you might as well call me Gideon, or I might not.
Geoffrey
The Great American story. Well, Gideon sent me his book, which is right over there. It’s called Appreciating Shakespeare, when I was doing Harry Potter. And I, I acknowledged it, but I, that I, the receipt of it, which I was flattered to get, but, but I never, and I looked through it, not terribly carefully, but I looked through it and, but then I didn’t write to say what I thought of it. So I finally did, now that I went back to it. ’cause it has a section on winter’s tail and lots of other things that bear, I sort of need to get the rust knocked off, if you will. I haven’t done this kind of thing for a while, but it’s really a terrific, and it’s called appreciate. I’ll tell you part of what I said to Gideon, it, it’s called Appreciating Shakespeare. And what I like about it is it, it is just scholarly enough to, you know, to be useful and interesting that way.
But, but it’s, it’s for appreciating there’s, it’s not, you know, this is how you should do Shakespeare or breaking down Shakespeare or what’s the secret in Shakespeare. It’s, it’s much more appreciating the way audiences appreciate Shakespeare in the way you’ve all worked with me. The, the way I like to approach things, very tech-based. We’re not trying to impose anything other than what’s there. But the, the thing that’s there, it’s like a, it’s like a mine. You keep, you know, you go in for gold and you pull out silver and nickel and uranium and all, all other things, you know?
Gideon
And gold.
Geoffrey
And gold, yes. Absolutely. As, but it, it’s interesting how many, you know, I’ve come to the Southwest, it’s interesting how many old mines started off as gold mines and ended up being richer as silver mines that you, you, they found things they didn’t expect, or, anyway, I don’t wanna draw this metaphor out too long, but it’s, it’s, that’s, that’s what I like about these sessions, and it is, it’s a terrific book.
Gideon
Well, thank you. I really, I really appreciate your appreciation.
Geoffrey
Because.
Gideon
I, I chose the title on purpose and my, my purpose is to get people to appreciate Shakespeare and not, not to abuse him and, and on the principle that their lies would be more enriched by appreciating what he’s actually offering then by trying to turn him into something, you know, that mirrors their own preconceptions. Yeah.
Geoffrey
So.
Gideon
It’s, I really, really appreciate your comments.
Geoffrey
Well, good, good. So we’ve got a, and then Gideon, these, I’ve worked with both these people, Chris and Shannon before as a director. And Shannon and I have done at least one reading, one great reading. We did that on Zoom. Wait, was it? No, it wasn’t on Zoom. It was here.
Gideon
No, yeah, it was actually in person.
Geoffrey
It was actually in person. It was great. And I’m, I’m a huge admirer of Chris Gilmet and, and his skills. So yeah, I, I, I, I and, and a co-director put these through two, put these two through a particularly grueling production of The Crucible, Which, sorry, that’s my ex’s dog. Oh, no, that’s fine. Our dog will appear eventually.
It, it, it, it, it was unusual Gideon in that about 85% of it was, although it was on a stage and it was staged, was presented directly to the audience there. When, when we got to sort of two handers scenes, we would do them as more conventional scenes. And it was extremely demanding, difficult to rehearse and tricky for audiences for the first 10 minutes or so, but they then got into it. It was, it was terrific. And these two were spectacularly good, so.
Gideon
Wonderful.
Geoffrey
Yeah.
Gideon
Audiences, so audiences will accept what you expect them to accept.
Geoffrey
I, I 100% subscribe to that, which, which makes me think of, I, I, I don’t, I’m mean, I’ve obviously been dying to just talk to people for ages, but, but that, that’s a funny thing you find in plays and, and you find sometimes when you’re trying to do a Shakespeare play or scene that something that it just doesn’t, you know, you can’t quite figure it out, but you so go ahead and do it anyway, like running over a pothole or something, and the the audience fills it in for you. They, they won’t consi, you know, not every person has the same interpretation. If.
Gideon
If the surround, if everything’s surrounding it, is in place and done with conviction and clarity, the audience will fill it in. Yeah. If, if you expect the audience to do more work than they can do and other things fall apart, then it’s, it doesn’t work. Yeah. But the superstructure has to be there.
Geoffrey
Absolutely. Well.
Nathan
Go ahead. Yeah, I just, I just wanted to say very, very quickly, again, I’m, I’m so grateful and thankful to everybody joining us and, and Chris Shannon and welcome into this, you know, Gideon and Jeffrey have, have done a few of these and as I hopefully are attempted to convey, you know, and, and the initial communications with you guys, this is all about just diving deep on the scene, on characters, on text. It’s, there’s no emphasis on finality on, on anything being, you know, performance ready. It’s, it’s just a continued exploration and a chance for you guys to explore this work in a way that doesn’t often happen. Even with professional productions, you don’t, you often get this much time, you know, a whole month on 15 minutes of material or something.
So I’m really thrilled that you guys can join us and it’s been, it’s been a good series to keep doing. There’s a, a couple things I, I try to do at the, at the very beginning, one I wanna remember to say it’s helpful, even though, you know, just about everybody knows everybody in some form. Just doing some quick introductions is always good to just get everybody on the same page. And we do, as I mentioned, we have some people through Patreon who support the project and covering just some of our production costs. And so I just wanna say thank you to Michelle Christian, Jim Magdalene, evar, and Frank, thank you very much for your support for this project.
And yeah, that’s, that’s that I’m happy to answer any questions either here or offline if anyone has any questions about what it is we’re doing here and why we’re doing this. But it’s been a great success and to, you know, even this isn’t a scene we’ve worked on before, but even when we have a returning scene, we have different actors, different directors, different, you know, there’s just new stuff that you keep finding. So I’m always excited. I’m, I, I always feel like I have the, the best seat in the house ’cause I just get to sit here and listen to all the great discussion. And I can’t believe people show up to keep doing this. So I’m, I’m thrilled. I feel like a kid in the candy store, so thank you for that.
And uhm guess I’ll do a very, very quick intro for you guys and, and anyone watching though, they’re probably bored of me by this point.
My name is Nathan Agan. I, I was acted in LA for a number of years. I knew Jeffrey through the company and a very long circuitous path that included traveling and being nomadic. I ended up in San Diego where I connected with Gideon. And then during the pandemic, as I mentioned, just I, I knew a bunch of great actors who had a lot of time on their hands. And I said, what do you guys wanna do? And that was, it was as simple as that, just kind of getting everybody to the same Zoom room and, and they were happy to do, do something worthwhile. I, in addition to this, I do, you know, audiobooks and kind of keep myself creative that way. And, but yeah, I, I love this project and, and just always enjoy bringing people together.
One of my goals with this is that it, it fosters the kind of, kind of cross generational communication and, and learning that, I think the acting tradition came from, you know, like it was kind of more of a model of apprenticeship for a long time. And we’ve kind of gotten away from that with, you know, the emphasis on TV and film and technology and self-tapes and all that kind of stuff. But I think there’s still a lot of value in being in the same room and everybody being equals and collaborators and, and a lot of great discussion comes from it. And for me, the results always speak for themselves. That, you know, you put some great artists in a room for a month, you, you’re gonna be very pleased and amazed what happens from week one, which is usually still pretty good to week four, you know, it’s, it’s really cool. So thank you again for being part of this and, and I’ll, I’ll turn it over, Jeffrey, our, our fearless leader, if you want to jump in from there.
Geoffrey
Excuse me. Sure. I’ll introduce myself. I’m Jeffrey Wade. I have done a couple of these before and they’re always very interesting. I’m an actor, principally, I’ve directed a few things. I’ve acted in basically all mediums, but mainly mainly theater.
The most recent big thing was playing Snape up in San Francisco in the, in that Harry Potter.
I, I, I don’t really have a lot more to say other than I’m just delighted to be able to, you know, sort of facilitate these discussions more than, more than direct direct it.
Although that’s often, I mean, I, that’s often what the best directing is anyway, so I, you know, if, if, if you are someone who’s watching doesn’t know me, excuse me, you’ll learn more as we go along. So I will pass this over to Chris, who happens to be on my right at the moment. God knows where you are. There.
Chris
I, god knows, indeed three hours ahead. So I, Chris Gillnet, I am actor residing in Buffalo, although I used to live, I acted all over, all over everywhere. I used to live in la, New York before that. Seattle had the great pleasure of being a member of Anus and doing some spectacular stuff there. Mostly not on stage, but in the library around the table where all of the actors would sit and read the play and then read the play again and we would talk that was just, just heaven and the production of The Crucible that Jeffrey co-directed still counts as one of my most satisfying theatrical experiences.
It was just, it was so cool and hard, but very, very cool.
And I dunno what else to say other than I’m super excited to, to dive into these few pages. This is one of my favorite Shakespeare plays and I have literally been dying to play you for a long time, so even just getting a taste of it’s gonna be very cool.
Shannon
Great. Shannon, how about.
Chris
You?
Shannon
Hi, I’m Shannon Lee Claire and I also met Jeffrey through ts and gosh, we did The Crucible a long time ago now it’s kind of crazy. I got to be, you know, strangled by Chris in that for a moment on stage. That was fun.
I’ve mostly acted in LA but also Seattle and Olympia, Washington. And I just finished doing a show, a production of Ma about Nothing in Monterey, which was a lot of fun with a brand new theater company that started in 2022 when all the other ones are struggling along, but hopefully getting firmer footing and being an unusual person. I grew up in LA since the age of four, so that, that’s crazy.
And I’m excited to do this. I, I’ll admit that Winter’s Tale is a play i I struggle to love, so I am very intrigued to spend more time with it.
Nathan
Wonderful. Great. And Gideon?
Gideon
So I started out trying to teach college. I taught for 10 years in college colleges, didn’t want a dead white male in those years, so I ended up teaching high school for 40 how many years? 20, 32 years at two private high schools in San Diego.
And in the meantime worked as dramaturg on productions of Shakespeare around town and around California and other places intermittently.
And then I retired from teaching so that I wouldn’t be fired for the 20 times in the next few years and started finishing the books I’d been planning to write. So the first one is the one we talked about appreciating Shakespeare. I’ve got an addition of Hamlet about to come out, I hope by the end of this year with thorough annotations of my own.
I’ve got a book on Shakespeare’s figures of speech, which is a collection of examples of all the figures in outline form. And that’s being proofread now, and then a few other books in the pipeline plant.
And I’m still working on and off as dramaturg as you can see. I just did a community theater production of Midsummer Night Stream locally here in San Diego. And, and I, I specialized in Shakespeare because when I was in graduate school, I thought that Shakespeare would wear me out before I could wear him out. And that turned out to be true. Not that I’m worn out yet, but he is perennially alive and fascinating and new. So I’m very glad to be with you working on this play. I think it’s one of Shakespeare’s very greatest plays. It’s a very deep play in some ways.
And if Jeffrey wants me to say a couple words about it later, I will. But that’s probably enough for right now.
Nathan
That’s great. Thank you Gideon, and thank you everybody for joining. And what I, what I love about these sessions is that a, we get to bring people together from all parts of the country that otherwise might not be working together. And two, you know, not to say it’s, it, it is happening in this group, but sometimes people feel like, geez, I don’t know if I’m ever gonna play this role, or I don’t know if I ever would be cast in this role. This is where, you know, the opportunity to work on these parts can sometimes happen. So I’m thrilled to hear Chris, that you’ve been, you know, eyeing Leons and you know, it’s, it’s great that you get a crack at it. So I’m, I’m thrilled about that.
Geoffrey
Me too.
Nathan
All right, well, I’m gonna disappear. I’ll be listening. You probably won’t have any questions for me, which I’m totally fine with and I hope you guys all have a great couple hours. Thank.
Geoffrey
You. Thanks Nathan. Right. Well, this, this is so great. I’m I am I, I’m glad that you wanted to do Leon. I I just thought that was perfect.
It took 12, six seconds to text back. Yeah, I wanna do that. Yeah, it’s great. It, it’s, yeah, this is perfect for it. And, and Shannon, I’m, I’m fascinated to hear that you’re not, you don’t have to be in love with it, but this, it’s.
Shannon
Just one that I, I’ve never seen a production that ah, has blown me away. Yeah.
Geoffrey
Okay. Well, it’s, it’s not easy and, and well, I think we’ll have without much more ado from me speak about it a bit about like, like where it comes in his, in his gide in, and I know we all know it’s a late comedy, actually a tragic comedy. It’s got this double thing going on. There’s a lot of double things going on throughout the play, but the, the entire structure of it is a tragedy. If you could, and you could stop it there, I mean, it’d be a, you know, a good hour and a half play and then it turns into this entirely other thing. So yeah, gi give us a little background on where it sits in, in his life and maybe just, just just a, a, a big overview so we get to discover it ourselves as we go along. Oh, and just let me, I quickly say with regard to Paul, he couldn’t be here for this session, which is too bad, but I I will, when we get to it, I’ll, I’ll obviously read his parts and maybe get in, you can read the Lord and when we get to that.
But Paul, I, I worked with Paul for a little over a year on Curious incident of the dog in the nighttime. We were both on that tour, and I saw that, so that, that’s, that’s where I know him from principally. And he’s just finishing, I think he’s still finishing up doing one of these, a measure for measure with a guy named Stefan Novinski is directing that. Yeah, just finished last, the other last week. Right. I’ve, I’ve seen bits of a, of a couple of ’em. I haven’t seen them all yet. I worked with Stefan y years ago in, in a class he was teaching. So these things, you, you do get a lot of crosscurrents, which is great. So Paul, Paul will be here.
He will see, he will see all this. And, and then we’ll, we’ll pick up from there. So Gideon, why don’t you help place this for us and let us know.
Chris
What’s going on Before Gideon starts, I just say I, I’m gonna disappear from the camera, but I’m gonna still be hearing, but I have some rambunctious, absolutely have to corral for a second. Okay, good, good. Carry on. I’ll talk loud. I, I’m, I got the headphones, they’ll travel with me, but I’m gonna.
Gideon
Talk loud anyway.
Chris
Thank you.
Gideon
Okay. So yes, it’s a late play. It comes after Parles and Simline and before The Tempest. So it’s, it’s one of the very last plays Shakespeare wrote, I think the most important thing to say about, well, it’s a tragic com, tragic comedy was becoming fashionable, the cross pollination of categories we remember from Polonius and Hamlet talking about tragic, historical, comical, pastoral.
But Shakespeare was in his mood of redemption, the facing eternity. He only lived a few more years after writing this play. And so Parles and Simline and this play and the Tempest are all about the kinds of things that made tragedies happen in earlier plays. Transfigured transformed, redeemed and turned into something mysterious and profound and beautiful and something else. So that’s kind of a, a, the general characteristic of those four last plays before he did Henry VIII afterwards and, and two noble kinsman with Fletcher. But those were kind of, they weren’t peak Shakespeare productions, they were kind of money makers. I think in any case, the most important thing to know about, well, what happens before we do our scene is to compare, is to think about the comparison between this play and Othello.
Because in Othello there’s also a jealous husband for no good reason.
But the whole middle of the play is a, a very long, very profound and powerful scene of seduction into jealousy by Iago of Othello. Othello is man and Des demon is kind of angelic, and Iago is a, is demonic figure. And the demonic figure tempts this man into destruction through jealousy. In this play by contrast, Shakespeare takes that holy yago passage of converting or or seducing a fellow into jealousy. As a given, it happens instantaneously. There’s no process. It’s a complete shock to everyone. And those directors, you’ll forgive me, Jeffrey, who tried to hint that there’s something in the scene and there’s something in the relationship between Pulis and Hermione that triggers the suspicion of Leon’s. Get it, I think completely wrong.
The whole point of the thing is the shock of it, the surprise to everybody, including the audience. And it’s, it’s, as you were talking about, doubles, it’s paralleled at the end of the play by another shock, which is that the next to last scene, all the denu ma is explained in, in third person discussion, all the resolutions of the plot that we are expecting happen off stage and are told to us, and we can’t figure out why. It’s, why we’re not seeing it. And then the very last scene comes and it’s this magical transformation that nobody expects. So those kind of bookend the, the movement of the play. And there’s kind of magical transformations happening in the middle as well, including a 14 year hiatus in the development of the plot, which is on unheard of. It breaches all the classical standards of, of unity, of time, place in action. So, but anyway, I won’t go into a long discussion.
The point I I wanna make is that Hermione is surprised. We are surprised. Antagonists is surprised, Paulina, everybody’s surprised by what is happening to Leones. And there is nothing in the relation between ities Andy that is ill or suspicious. The play begins with joy and pleasure and Witt and all the, the, the playing about sex in the first scene before Leon’s too hot speech is courtly Witt. And then suddenly he says to us, too hot, too hot. And we realize that he’s fallen into this profound jealousy. And it’s like my image of it is like dropping a peddle, a pebble in a pond. And the, the circles of wave move outward steadily.
Leon’s jealousy turns into suspicion of his wife and of his best friend, Zenni. Then it expands to take in Camilo, then it expands to take in Hermione and the baby and antagonists. And it just expands and spans until the turning point when the Oracle calls him and says, no, this is wrong, Hermione is innocent, et cetera. And he says, there is no truth in the Oracle. So it expands to the gods. And this is a degree of arrogance that is only matched by King Lear at the beginning of that play.
And then MIUs dies and Leones comes to his senses and he admits that it was all wrong. He had no justification, et cetera. And then he has to do penance for all that time. And then the, the play goes to spring and beauty in, in Bohemian, and then everybody comes back and there’s the resolution. So the scenes we’re doing are Leon’s accusing his wife still in this great state of jealousy and her misany shocked, surprised, and not initially angry, but trying to figure out what’s going on and realizing, hinting to the future of the play that the auntie’s is gonna be sorry for this later. She, she says that in this scene, you’re gonna be very sorry later that you’re doing this now.
And then she submits to patience and allows the gods to unfold as, as they will this story.
So I think unless Jeffrey, you have specific questions for me to address, I could go on for an hour, but I’ll stop there. Yeah. And, and then we can fill in as we need to.
Geoffrey
Good. No, I think that’s, I think that’s sufficient. And, and I’m sure we’ll, other aspects of this will come up. I think it’s, it’s funny that I was just giving my little thing about the audience being able to fill in potholes that we, we can’t explain or, and I, although the, the beginning is truly shocking and the end is magical. Although magic seems how somehow easier to cope with and explain than, than an instantaneous, his instantaneous fall into jealousy. And I, yeah, I I think it’s.
Gideon
I I, let me just say one thing about that instantaneous fall in, in the Bible, there are, there are specific rules in the Torah about how you deal with a man who has fallen into a jealousy of his wife. He accuses his wife of sleeping with someone else, and there’s a test, there’s a magical test where she has to drink this potion of words scraped into a cup with dirt in it. And if she collapses, then she’s guilty. And if she doesn’t, then she’s innocent and he has to take her back and forgive everything. ’cause she didn’t do anything wrong. It’s sort of like the crucible in a way. There’s this magical test.
So Shakespeare knows this. He has this in mind that there, that it is possible for people to fall into a violent passion without that long seductive, you know Yeah. Labor of iga.
Geoffrey
Yes, yes. Exactly. And, and that’s why I think it’s, I’ve always thought it was more, more interesting than problematic, if you will be. Because in all of drama, usually not this dramatically, but what interests us in drama are people’s, what’s the word I want? It’s not their, it’s their inconsistencies. That’s, that’s the, the very essence of drama. I, I was, I, I finally went to see, excuse me, I’m gonna be like this all afternoon, obviously Oppenheimer yesterday. And I was, I think it’s magnificent. Well, I was much more moved than I expected to be. I expected to be very interested in the, the story and all, but I, I found it almost even now, I find it hard to think about or talk about. I mean, I was, I, I could hardly move at the end of it.
N not, not because of, I, I don’t know. It’s, it was like so many there, there’s a lot of despair in it. There’s a lot of despair in that movie. But it’s also, it’s on a Shakespearean scale. And you have a, you have a central character who is, he is inconsistent all over the place. You know, he, he doesn’t behave the way you expect that sort of person to behave. Whatever that sort is. And that’s what makes him, will make him endlessly fascinating. You know, compare him to Prometheus quite quite rightly.
So that initial thing, which obviously we’re not gonna deal with in this scene, it’s, it, it, I I just think o audiences will take it. And if they, if they go out after the show and say, what the hell happened there? How could that be? You know, someone will say, someone will say it’s impossible, and another person will say, no, I’ve, I’ve felt that way. I’ve, I’ve felt an inexplicable rage or jealousy or, or love, I mean there, you know, two sides of the same coin perhaps. And.
Gideon
The language gives it such body, the language makes it so convincing both the, both the, the sociable and lovable relations at the beginning and the content of his jealousy after Yeah. In it. And Shakespeare makes it absolutely irresistible.
Geoffrey
And, and again, as, as you said, the, the surprise element is it’s like to go, to go back to movies, it’s like that blast of sound that makes you jump. I if if there, if there’d been little telltales, somebody in your party would’ve said, oh, I knew all along. I knew it. I could see them. I could see them. And, and it just takes that edge of, of the shock off of it. There’s.
Gideon
One word.
Geoffrey
So it’s a completely theatrical effect, if you will.
Gideon
Yes. But there’s one word where Shakespeare does that hinting, I think. And that’s in the first, very first scene where he says their love cannot, but branch now and branch for Shakespeare on the surface means blossom and flower and spread out and be good to everybody. And that’s the primary meaning. But branch also means to branch out and separate.
And he doesn’t mean that on the surface, but it’s underneath. So he’s, it, it, it’s, he may be hinting at this, but with, but without telegraphing it in such a way that we say, I knew that was gonna happen. Yeah. We do not know it’s gonna happen.
Geoffrey
Great. Well.
Gideon
Lemme just add one more thing. But this plot is based on a novel by green in which everybody die. Like the, the main character Hermione, when she dies is dead. Like there’s no statue at the end. There’s no renewal. So, and it was a very popular romance that a lot of people read. So when they came into the theater, even the people who knew the book were shocked at the end of the play. Yeah. ’cause it, it changes the, the end of Green’s novel.
And it’s like you knowing the story of Oppenheimer and still being moved by what you’re discovering in this experience. Yeah.
Geoffrey
Yeah. Okay. Well that’s, that’s all great stuff. What do, do you poor guys have just been sitting here listening to this. It’s great. Do you have questions that you wanna ask now? Do you, what would, do you want to let do, do you have any questions you want to ask now before we even start?
Chris
No.
Geoffrey
Okay.
Chris
But I do have a, a a thought about how the, the, the jealousy comes over you. He’s early in the play and the way Shakespeare has written it, where it starts with an aside to the audience. Like he’s given a little confession to the audience and then, and then he gets more and more, oh.
Geoffrey
Anna side. Yes.
Chris
Yeah. That, that reminds me of how when you have suspicions of your lover and, and are feeling that jealousy, that you get these intrusive thoughts that kind of come out of nowhere. Like I see. And you start to see things that aren’t there and whether or not he intended it.
It’s kinda, it’s, it, it, in my mind, it’s a very playable thing that, that it’s, it’s the sudden intrusive thought that has to come outta his mouth for the audience. And then it overtakes him the way Shakespeare’s written it, it it, the words overtake it as well. I think it’s, I think it’s very.
Geoffrey
Believable.
Chris
What I’ve said, like 12 times.
Geoffrey
No, no.
Chris
I think it, I know it’s psychological realism is not a Shakespearean thing, but where we come from in the 21st century, it’s very easy to apply in the way the text is laid out.
Gideon
Yeah. I think it’s, I think it does apply. I think his, he uses rhetorical devices to convey psychological realism and sentences. Leon’s sentences are all broken up. And he’s, he’s connecting everything and it’s all about horns. So it’s, it’s chaotic. He’s, he’s not chaotic and then he is chaotic in his language.
Geoffrey
I, I, I, I think, and it’s only ’cause I watched a bit of that measure for measure stuff. And I don’t know if they actually worked on this line, but I was thinking, is it Angelo when he says, what’s this, what’s this? It re it reminds me of too hot too. I’ve always thought what’s this is, is too, you know, she, she goes out of the room and all of a sudden he’s like, what the what, what, what, what is going on?
Gideon
What’s happening to me?
Geoffrey
What’s happening? What’s happening to me? And.
Gideon
Mono syllables.
Geoffrey
Yeah. It’s, I think, I think they’re just absolutely brilliant lines and I mean, I’m sure we’ve all at some time or other said to ourselves, either under our breath or, or you know, out loud. It’s like, what, what, what, what, what just happened? And not, not, you know, what happened over there? What, what, what just happened in my, in my heart that’s like, what, wait, what? What’s going on? So yeah, I think it’s, you know, an, an illustration of yes, of course. He’s certainly not, we’re we’re not dealing with modern, you know, Freudian psychology, but he knows he Shakespeare, the, the, the playwright knows human psychology, you know, that you don’t have to know Freud and Jung and all those people to write a, a great play now or then. But I think you.
Gideon
Have to know Shakespeare to understand Freud and Jung probably.
Geoffrey
Probably. Right. So let’s let, let’s, let’s just read the scene and, and just read it through without, I think this first time without, you know, stopping or anything. And then we’ll, we’ll go through again and, you know, start to pick things apart. And, you know, I timed the reason I I wanted to do that other bit in act three. Is it? Yeah. The Act three saying is Shannon. So you could have a little more of a, of a go at something because it’s, it’s these things mostly these, these two guys. And, and we’ll just do it as a, you know, a separate scene. I’m not gonna try to knit them together or anything like that.
’cause I mean, you know, too much has happened. She had the baby and, and Camila and them of a pissed off the Bohemian.
So let, let’s read the first one, pause for a second and then just go straight into the next one. Okay. Does that sound good? Yes. Right. I’m gonna, I’m gonna turn off my camera and video camera and, and mute myself unless something really comes up. So you guys just take your time and enjoy.
Chris
All right. Are we ready?
Shannon
Yes. But what are we, we, we obviously don’t have everyone. So where are we started? Yes, we don’t.
Geoffrey
So yeah, so lemme come back
and, oops. Stilt. Oh, bloody hell.
L l let, let’s start at at the, at Leon’s entrance and I’ll, I will read the Lord and antigens. So I’ll, I better stay on.
So I’ll read the Lord antigens and that should, that should get us through.
Chris
Okay?
Geoffrey
Okay.
Chris
Yep.
Was he met there? His train Camilla with.
Geoffrey
Behind the tuft of pines, I met them never saw men scour. So on their way, I add them even to their ships.
Chris
How blessed am I in my just censure my true opinion, A lack for lesser knowledge. How a cursed in being so blessed there may be in a cup a spider steeped in one may drink, depart, and yet partake no venom for his knowledge is not infected. But if one present the horrid ingredient to his eye, make known how he had drunk cracks his gorge, his sides with violet hefts. I have drunk and seen the spider.
Camillo was his helping this, his pander. There was a plot against my life. My crown alls true. That is mistrusted. That false villain whom I employed was pre employed by him. He has discovered my design and I remain a pinched thing. Yay. A very trick for them to play. It will how came the posture and so easily open.
Geoffrey
By his great authority, which often have no less prevailed than so on your command.
Chris
I know it too well gimme the boy. I’m glad you did not nurse him though. He does bear some signs of me. You too much. Sorry though. He I am glad you did not nurse him though. He does bear some signs of me yet. You too.
I dunno why I can’t read that though. He does bear some signs of me has too much blood in him.
Shannon
What is this sport?
Chris
Bear the boy hands. He shall not come about her away with him and let support herself with that. She’s big win for his has made me swell thus.
Shannon
But I’d say he had not. And I’ll be sworn you would believe me, saying how heir you leaned ward.
Chris
You. My lords looked on her. Mark her well be but about to say she is a goodly lady. And the justice of your hearts will thereto add his pity. She’s not honest, honorable, praise her. But for this her without door form, which on my faith deserves high, high speech and straight the shrug, the humble ha, the petty brands that Cal book used. Oh, I am out that mercy does for cal will sear virtue itself. These drugs, these hums and ha when you have said she’s goodly come between air, you can say she’s honest, but be it known from him that has most cause to grieve. It should be she’s an adulterous.
Shannon
Should a villain say so the most replenished villain in the world, he were as much more villain. You my lord dub. But mistake.
Chris
You have mistook my lady for leones. Oh, that thing which I’ll not call a creature of my place yet less barbarism making me the presidential. Like should I like language used to all degrees and mannerly distinguishment leave out twitch the prince and beggar. I have said she’s an adulterate. I have said with whom more she’s a traitor and Camilo is a ary with her and one that knows what she should shame to know herself. But with her most vile principle that she’s a bed swer. Even as bad as those that vulgar give boldest titles, I I’m privy to this. Their late escape.
Shannon
No by my life privy to none of this. How will this grieve you? When you shall come to clearer knowledge that you thus have published me? Gentle my Lord, you scarce can write me throughly then to say you did mistake.
Chris
No. If I mistake in these foundations which I build upon the center is not big enough to bear a schoolboy’s top away with her to prison. He who shall speak for her is a far off guilty. But that he speaks.
Shannon
There’s some ill planet reigns. I must be patient till the heavens look with an aspect more favorable good. My lords I am not prone to weeping as our sex commonly are the one of which vain dew per chance shall dry your pities. But I have that honorable grief lodged here, which burns worse than tears drown Beit, you all my lords with thought so qualified as your charities shall best instruct you, measure me. And so the kings will be performed.
Chris
Shall I be heard?
Shannon
Who is that goes with me. Beseech your highness. My women may be with me for you. See, my plight requires it to not weep good fools. There is no cause. When you shall know your mistress has deserved, deserved prison then abound in tears as I come out this action now I go on is for my better grace. I do my Lord. I never wished to see you. Sorry. Now I trust I shall my women come. You have leave.
Chris
Go do our bidding heads.
Geoffrey
De seat your highness. Call the queen again. Be certain what you do, sir. Let your justice prove violence in the which three great ones suffer yourself, your queen, your son.
For my Lord I dare my life. Lay down and we’ll do, sir, please you accept it that the queen is spotless in the eyes of heaven and to you, I mean in this which you accuse her.
Oh, I’m sorry. If it proves she’s otherwise I’ll keep my stables where I lodge my wife. I’ll go and couples with her than when I feel and see her no further trust her. For every inch of woman in the world, I every dram of woman’s flesh is false. If she be.
Chris
Hold your pieces good.
Geoffrey
My Lord, it is for you. We speak not for ourselves. You are abused by some. Put her on. That will be damn for when I knew the villain, I would land damn him be she honor flawed. I have three OTTs, three daughters. The eldest is 11, the second and third nine and some five. If this prove true, they’ll pay for it by mine honor. I’ll gel them all.
14. They shall not see to bring false generations. They are co-heirs and I’d rather glib myself than that. They should not produce fair issue.
Chris
Cease no more. You smell this business with a sense as colds, a dead man’s nose. But I do see it and feel it and you feel doing thus and see with all the instruments that feel.
Geoffrey
If it be so. We need no grave to bury honesty. There’s not a grain of it. There’s not a grain of it. The face to sweeten of the whole Dungy earth.
Chris
But lack, I credit.
Geoffrey
I had rather you did lack than I my Lord upon this ground and more it would content me to have her on a true than your suspicion. Be blamed for it. How you might.
Chris
By what need we commune with view of this, but rather follow our forceful instigation. Our prerogative calls not your councils, but our natural goodness imparts this. Which if you or stupid five or seeming so in skill cannot or will not relish a troop like us, inform yourselves. We need no more of your advice. The matter, the loss, the gain, the ordering on is all properly ours.
Geoffrey
And I wish my leash you had only in your silent judgment, tried it without more overture.
Chris
How could that be either thou our most ignorant by age or th were born a fool. Camilla’s flight added to their familiarity, which was as gross as ever touched. Conjecture that lacked sight only not for approbation, but only seeing all other circumstances made up the deeded, the pushed it on. This proceeding yet for a greater confirmation for an act of this importance, Torah, most hideous to be wild, I have dispatched in post to sacred phos to Apollo’s temple, the nominees and Dion, whom you know of stuffed sufficiency now from the oracle they will bring all whose spiritual counsel had shall stop or spur me. Have I done well.
Geoffrey
Well done, my Lord.
Chris
So I’m satisfied and need no more than what I know. Yet shall Oracle give rest to the minds of others, such as he whose ignorant credulity will not come up to the truth.
So we thought it good from our free person, she should be confined lest that the treachery of those two fled, he left her to perform. Follow us. We have to speak in public for this business will raise us all.
Geoffrey
To laughter as I take it if the good truth were known. All right,
let’s just gimme a second to get to the other one here.
Gideon
Jeffrey, I thought she should start it now for conspiracy. A couple lines before the line number you gave.
Geoffrey
Okay.
Gideon
Just so we know what the it is that she’s talking about.
Geoffrey
We seen to, yeah, let just hang on one second. Just, I’m trying to find my, my place here.
Gideon
Act three, scene two, line 75 or six.
Geoffrey
Three. Scene two, one, just, just one. Almost there.
I’m and Gideon. What, what, where did you say she should start? I think.
Gideon
She should start at line 76, the middle of the line where it says now for conspiracy.
Geoffrey
Now for conspiracy. Sure. Okay. Yeah. Otherwise we don’t know what, know what the it is that she’s referring to. Yes, yes. Okay, good.
Shannon
Now for conspiracy, are we going, sorry, I’m.
Geoffrey
Just, you’re I’m, I’m sorry. I’ll bow out this time.
Shannon
Now for conspiracy, I know not how it tastes though. It’d be dished for me to try. How all I know of it is that Camilla was an honest man and why he left your court, the gods themselves wanting no more than I are ignorant.
Chris
You knew of his departure as you know what you have entertained to do in his absence.
Shannon
Sir, you speak a language that I understand not my life stands on the level of your dreams, which I’ll lay down.
Chris
Your actions are my dreams. You had a bastard by P and I’ve dreamed it as you were past all shame. Those of your fact, those of your facts. So, so past all truth, which to deny concerns more than avails for us by bratt has been cast out like to itself, no father owning it, which is indeed more criminal indeed than it.
So thou shall feel our justice in those easiest passage. Look for no less than death.
Shannon
Sir, spare your threats. The bug which you would frighten me with, I seek to me, can life be no commodity. The crown and comfort of my life. Your favor. I do give lost. Try to feel it gone, but no, not how it went. My second joy, the first fruits of my body from my presence, I am barred like one infectious. My third comfort starred most unluckily is from my breast. The innocent milk in its most innocent mouth hailed out to murder myself. On every post proclaimed a trumpet with a modest hatred. The child bed privilege denied, which longs to women of all fashion. Lastly, hurried here to this place of the open air before I have got strength of limit.
Now my le tell me what blessings I have alive that I shall fear to die, therefore proceed. But yet hear this, mistake me, not no life I prize. Is it I prize it? Not a straw, but for my honor, which I would free if I shall be condemned upon surmises, all proofs sleeping else. But what your jealous is awake, I tell you it is rigor and not law. Your honors all I do refer me to the oracle Apollo. Be my judge.
That’s where going to.
Geoffrey
Yes, that’s where we’re going to. I, I was just motoring. I was just saying. Good, good, good, good. You didn’t hear my, my complimenting everyone good. Before I start saying things, things, a couple of things to say.
Did anything leap out for either of you? I know it’s hard to read and I think of your questions at the same time, but did, were there any, anything that leapt out for either of you? Shannon, why don’t you start?
Shannon
I mean, the first one is a little hard to navigate in the face of the accusations and just, just figuring out sort of where, what pieces she’s putting together where, and deciding obviously sort of what approach she’s taking, you know, is is she like, oh, calming him down, figuring it out, trying to approach it Like this is a crazy weird joke until she is like, oh no, this is, this is really, he’s very serious and this is insane, you know, which is just stuff to play around with.
Geoffrey
Ab. Absolutely. And, and I think the, let me just get back to the, I was gonna print this stuff out, but my printer, of course has decided to die. I, I think the key to what you just said is
you said figuring out what, what pieces she’s putting together, which is exactly what’s happening as she’s putting together the, it’s both of these scenes, this one in in particular, she’s, she’s bl blindsided in both of me. And once again, speaking of great kind of
opening lines, what’s the first thing you say? You say basically what.
Shannon
Right? And that one, that ones kind of, it feels, I mean you literally.
Geoffrey
Say.
Shannon
Natural response. Like what is this? I guess the one that’s hardest is because we share this line where he’s, it’s what line? 80 something he had, he Publicis has made the swell thus, and I finish with, but I’d say he had not, which is like, that’s where it’s it. She has the chance to go. Oh.
And, but having it sort of be finishing his line is such a quick response to such an unexpected accusation, if that makes sense.
Geoffrey
Yes. And we can have a shared line debate, but I, I think,
I think taking it as a shared line, it can be because she perhaps she, she not really thinking this through. I mean, the very first thing she, she literally says, are you joking? Are you kidding? And, and he goes on and he says, you know, that’s, that’s polix and it’s ese. Chris, can you hear me Chris? I can, I’m pretty sure it’s ese, not ese. Correct. You, you’ve been saying palase. Well that’s dumb because I, in my head I’m saying Palase. Oh, okay. So I’ll just, I’ll just That’s alright. Make, make your connect your head in your mouth. It’s ese. Yes. You know, he says you’re, you’re pregnant with him. And I, I think she doesn’t even
what Shakespeare’s given you is a woman who is, it’s, it’s such a blindsided thing that she doesn’t have to think about it. She says, IANS made you pregnant. No, he hasn’t. Oh, no. Yeah, no. I’d see.
Gideon
Does something about the, the way the line works. She’s a queen. He’s a king. She’s not used to contradicting him, especially in public. So she doesn’t say, no, I didn’t, or no he didn’t. She says, I would say that he had not under normal circumstances, that’s what I would say to such a statement. And I swear that if I did say something like that, you would believe me. Even if you didn’t tend to believe me, because that’s what the past has been. I don’t embarrass you in public. If I disagree with you, I put it in a hypothetical form and normally you would believe me. So let’s assume that’s what’s happening now. I would say no, and I, and you’re used to believing me and then he goes after her some more.
Geoffrey
Yeah. So yes. I, I I, both those things, I think she can come in that, that quickly because it doesn’t really re require, I mean, maybe, maybe she’s, she’s, we’re still in the possibility. ’cause these are fairly quick lines. Yeah. We’re still in the possibility that he’s making some kind of really bad, but still a joke. I mean, people make Yeah. Bad jokes all the time. It’s not, you’re like, okay.
Shannon
In a moment you’re gonna, you’re gonna clear up what is going on here.
Geoffrey
Right? Yeah. This isn’t really like you, but you, you gotta be, this is kidding, right, because but this just some boy joke that you guys did when you were kids. Come on it. It’s, it’s tasteless. But this is a joke. So I think, I think that perhaps is what allows you to respond quickly there. And then you have, you know, quite a chunk of text here and quite a lot of really horrible stuff from him. You know, people saying, yeah, she’s pretty, but it’s too bad. She’s a fucking whore. And I mean, I think almost again, I think it’s fascinating. You know, we first see her here, she’s very pregnant.
The next time we see her, she’s just delivered.
She, she’s, you know, for an actress, it seems to me to give you great physical givens with which to work.
But I, you know, these are terrible things to say to anyone, but to a woman who’s so pregnant in, you know, in front of other, there are other people here, they’re, they’re like slap It’s like he’s slapping you in the face or slapping you on your belly. I mean, something really horrible.
But she, you know, Hermione throughout remains a, a a very intelligent and sort of even keeled person. The the great wild stuff that Paulina gets to say is, you know, Shakespeare gives all of that to her so that, so that her, her minding never has, she never really, she never really gets in there and slugs it out with him. She’s, she’s sort of the embodiment of, of grace and forgiveness. Even now e even now it’s like when, when she leaves, she says, I I never thought I’d see her. Sorry, but I I I am sure I will now. Because even there that never.
Gideon
Wanted to see you. Sorry.
Geoffrey
Yeah. Ne never wanted to see you. Sorry. Oh.
Gideon
I do.
Geoffrey
Yeah. But e there’s, there’s a, there’s a, a note of grace even in, even in that yes, you’ll come round, you’ll come round, you will be taught or learn or some, something is going to shake you out of this.
And, and it’s sort of moving ahead. But even, even to that last longer speech, the whole point of it is, is what what you’re saying is rigor. It’s not law. It’s doesn’t make any sense. This is, this is, it is madness, right? Yeah. So.
Gideon
One of the words that’s connected with Hermione throughout and then, and then also to, is the word grace?
Geoffrey
Yes.
Gideon
And she, she, she keeps referring to it. She wants earlier in the play. She wanted, she hopes that her decision that Leon’s refers to was an act of grace. And so the, the word grace runs through the play, and it’s kind of thematic. And that’s, that’s what you were saying about her character all through, she’s got, she’s, she’s in touch with something higher, so that even when she’s accusing him, it’s based on principle. It’s not just based on personal bitterness. There’s plenty of personal bitterness, but it doesn’t come out as, that comes out as judicious judgment.
Geoffrey
I’m looking at, you know, ahead, that there’s all, all your lines with him there, there’s a lot of shared lines between you two. Yeah. And I think that this what you’re talking about, about, you know, trying to piece it together. A lot of this is going on as he’s speaking. Yeah. So that as, as soon as he, this one that starts, there’s some old planet reigns, you know, away, away to prison.
And anybody who even speaks for her is, is guilted, even for thinking of it, it, you, you don’t really resist. You don’t say anything. You just say, there’s something wrong here. There’s something. And, and now we, you know, we’re all familiar with, I, I hope you know, the society in which Shakespeare lived and, and wrote about a, a society where order was what we is, what we look for. You know, people belong in their, in their correct relationship to each other. So, so when she speaks about an ill planet reigning, it’s, you know, the, it’s the time is, this is my ship’s bell. The the time is out of joint. It’s the, there’s something really wrong here.
And I’ll be patient till the heavens look. With an aspect, with an aspect more favorable, have to see about that line. But, you know, with a, with a, when the heavens readjust, things will be better. I, I, I think she’s almost saying, I can’t, I can’t solve this yet. But she is, I.
Gideon
I must untangle this. Not, I it is too hard or not for me to unie.
Geoffrey
Yeah.
But again, she’s a, she has this faith, this grace that that it, it will happen.
Well, that was, that was a long response to it. Simple shared line thing. But a any, anything else?
Or did any of all that speechifying bring up something more?
Shannon
Not a specific No, go ahead, Chris.
Chris
Oh, I was gonna say about, about the shared line thing. I mean, I noticed this when I was going over the text that nearly all of my lines, I finished someone else’s line. Like, I’m not listening to anybody.
Geoffrey
Yes.
Chris
Pretty clear.
Geoffrey
Yes. Well, well, let’s, let’s move on to you in some thoughts, some thoughts I had or any questions that you have. First of all.
Chris
Not No, I want hear what, hear what you have to say first.
Geoffrey
W when you s I think it’s interesting that you said he’s not listening to anybody. I, I think that’s great. He’s not, certainly not taking in what, what people are saying. But I, I find it interesting the way his, he, he is kind of listening to himself and, and the way his speech sort of expands on itself. And, and I think technically when we start going this again, you, you can afford to take a lot more time. You, you can just slow yourself down the punctuation in this seems really good to me.
And, and I think you can make that punctuation your friend, you know, when you get, particularly when you get to full stops, you have a lot of full stops in the middle of lines, which is, again, is always interesting. It, it, I and, and, and look for those places where, where a something he started with a thought, he started with, he either amplifies himself with, you know, a, a new image or it leads him on to a whole new image that he, he keeps ramping up his, his obsession or his
hi his, his his conviction that what he’s saying is, is right. There’s where’s the line you have?
Chris
That’s kind of the way jealousy works too, but like Exactly.
Geoffrey
Exactly.
Gideon
I just wanna remind you that he’s also a king. So he’s used to getting his way. He’s used to deciding things and having people accept them. That’s, that’s the norm for him. So the idea that all these people should be resisting him is to him, as unacceptable as everything he’s saying is to everybody else.
Chris
No, I, and even I, I actually love the line where Hermione is. She’s talking about the ill planet. And so the kings will be performed. And all I say is like, is anybody gonna listen to what I just said? Yeah.
Geoffrey
Exactly. Is any what’s, how come nobody’s moving?
Chris
Sure.
Geoffrey
How come nobody’s.
Chris
Still here?
Geoffrey
Yeah. And.
Gideon
I’m wearing the crown. I’m still the king. I’m.
Geoffrey
Still the king, which it is. There’s also, you don’t have to worry about being interrupted very much either. Also, I think people are, I think everyone is gobsmacked, you know, which is such a great expression because it implies sort of hitting yourself in the mouth. Everybody’s gonna like, what on earth is going on here?
You do mistake. No period.
If I’m mistaken, in those foundations, which I build upon the center’s not big enough to bear a schoolboy’s top and Gideon, the, the center is, I’m assuming the world is that right? Yes. The world of the earth. So, you know, this, this thing gets bigger and bigger. You know what, what was an annoyance? I don’t know. You, you start with something very sort of mundane in a way. It’s like, who opened, who opened the doors? Who let the who, who let them out? You know, the posts, how’d they get out? So easy to, to comparing your situation to, to the world balanced on a little top. And I, I think it’s interesting that Hermione picks up on that image right away.
Well, the, in that case, the whole, all the planets are messed up.
The, just, just as, as you’ve spotted yourself, Chris, the way jealousy fuels itself in some really horrible way or, or, you know, anger, resentment, all those things. But in this case it’s jealousy, you know, as you’re.
Chris
Yeah. And.
Geoffrey
Sitting there lying there alone quietly and thinking. Yeah.
Chris
And that’s, that’s one of the reasons why I am going through the full stops in the lines, rather than taking a minute and then when they, when they come in the middle of the line, because it’s this, it’s that.
Geoffrey
Y y yes. Not.
Chris
Stopping enough to think. I, I mean, I’m willing to do, trying to think, but that’s like my initial thought was like, it’s a very.
Geoffrey
You, you have a lot, you have a lot of lines that are, that are run on, or is the term en jammed? Is that the term? Yes. Yeah. These lines that this very first one, a lack for lesser, lesser knowledge
Stop how a cursed. And then it continues right on. And being so blessed, they may be in the cup of spiders steeped and one might drink, depart, and yet partake no venom for his knowledge is not infected. I, I, I think you can, the what what we will hear again, since it is in it is fairly regular. We’ll, we’ll hear that you’re not kind of stopping at the, you know, at the end of 10 syllables where you should, I think you’ll get the, I think you’ll get an, I just think it’ll, it’ll help you navigate it instead of getting away from you, the actor, the, you know, if, if you run those lines too much together.
Chris
I, we, I I did. I was, I was getting ahead of.
Geoffrey
Yeah. We then can’t, we then can’t follow you. If, if take advantage of some of that po punctuation and let it lead you into the next, which carries over into a line, it stopping in the middle of a line, will, will. We’ll get.
Gideon
I I just wanna say that Shakespeare is doing a lot of that work for you.
Jeffrey’s saying that the en jammed lines, if you, if you’re aware of the meter and you’re, and the lines are going against the meter with these encampments and s in the middle, pauses in the middle of the line.
It’s the very tension between the, the expected meter and those breaks in the sentences that creates what you are trying to do by rushing past the, the punctuation. So I’m.
Chris
I’m not saying.
Gideon
I’m saying, I’m saying, I’m saying try it, try try it the other way and see if the verse itself will support what you’re trying to do with it.
Geoffrey
Yeah. That was, that, that’s my the main thing I wanna say. There, there, there
there’s a line that I’ve just never, maybe a a kine, you can help us out here. ’cause there’s a, there’s a line ca abouty.
Gideon
Oh yeah. That’s a tricky one. Where can you gimme a line number?
Geoffrey
Yeah. I’m just.
Chris
Thaty don’t use Oh, I amount that mercy does for Will sear.
Gideon
Yeah. What, 90? Yes.
Geoffrey
Yes. And this is, this is an interesting line. Again, it’s all broken up. You got a bastard died, but dreamed it as you were past all shame. Those of you fact are so, so past all truth, which to deny concerns more than avails for as that bratt has been cast out. It’s, is that where we are.
Gideon
We’re at?
Geoffrey
That’s just really, yeah.
Gideon
He’s, he’s breaking up because his mind is breaking up and we see it in the words.
Geoffrey
Yeah, it’s, I don’t, I don’t wanna make much this, I’m just gonna say it once and and we don’t have to, you know, make a deal out of it. But, you know, our not lamented late president does this shit all the time. He can’t make it through one sentence with all, without all this wandering around. And, and we sit out here. I assume some of us do. I’m wondering what’s, how is his mind working? I can’t, I can’t tell where, where he’s going with this. Yeah. He, he also, he also literally does what pol what Leoni says, which is, is just say no, they’re all lying. No, that’s a lie. No, it’s a god. A God said that. No, I don’t care. It’s a lie to God’s a wrong. I, I just, I couldn’t help but notice that. So where is the SSR line?
Gideon
Okay, so the line is at line 80 starts at line 87, and it’s built up. It’s complicated ’cause it’s built up. So let’s just go through it. Praise her butt for this, her without door form. If you start praising her looks, which on my faith deserves high speech.
Geoffrey
Yeah.
Gideon
Immediately straight. There’s the shrug, the hum, or the ha people start to praise her and then they go, yeah, but there’s this ha I don’t wanna talk about it.
Geoffrey
Right.
Gideon
Okay. These petty brands, that’s the hum the shrug. The hum the haw that callam diffuse. Callini means accusation. Right. False accusation very often. Okay. Callini usually uses these terms or these phrases to brand people shrug or hum or haw. And then he says, he interrupts himself. He says, no, that’s wrong. I’m out. I’m not getting it. Right. That is what mercy does. The shrug, the hum the haw the petty brands for Calendy will sear virtue itself. It’ll attack virtue itself.
And then he goes back to these shrugs, these hums and haws. When you have, she goes, he goes back to the original idea when you’ve said she’s goodly when you’ve said she’s beautiful, these hums and haws come between before you can say she’s honest. So the image of of a person saying she’s very beautiful and she’s very honest, but they don’t say that. They say she’s very beautiful and she’s very well mm. Can’t quite say she’s honest. That’s the image of the person he’s got in mind.
Geoffrey
R Right. I I think my, where, where I get a little confused is Calendy will see a virtue itself as as as opposed to what? As opposed to a person. These little brands are brands, brands of brandings on, you know.
Gideon
The brands are branding on person that you know is guilty.
Geoffrey
Right.
Gideon
And is guilty. So Cal. So.
Geoffrey
So the Mercy.
Gideon
Mercy will do, will use these brands on people who deserve it.
But NY will attack even the virtuous people who don’t deserve.
Geoffrey
Oh, okay.
Gideon
So Mercy behaves this way with these brands toward people who deserve the brands. And Calendy will attack even people who don’t deserve the brands.
Geoffrey
Okay.
Chris
Is it also that, just the way I’m putting this metal image in my mind is that it’s also merciful in a way. If someone says she’s pretty, the merciful response, if you think she’s a whores, they go and the slander swing though. No, she’s a whore.
Geoffrey
But.
Gideon
But Call will even say that about someone who isn’t And.
Chris
Calendly will say that, that somebody Yes. That, that, that as well. Yes.
Geoffrey
It’s, it’s, it’s interesting that it’s mercy that brands virtue it. It’s a.
Gideon
No Mercy brands, the people who deserve to be branded, even though they’re beautiful. ’cause they’re not virtuous.
So I, I.
Chris
Let’s.
Gideon
Feel.
Chris
Understand what you’re saying and can, and can make it happen. Okay.
Geoffrey
Good.
Gideon
Good. I’ll stop.
Chris
We’ll see. We’ll see.
Geoffrey
Yeah, it’s a, it’s.
Gideon
It’s.
Geoffrey
A tricky one. Let’s see.
Shannon
Is it like, is it like he’s correcting his own choice of word?
Gideon
Yes, yes.
Geoffrey
Yes. Yeah. That that’s exactly right. Oh yeah. That’s, that’s exactly what’s happening. Yes. I I I just, I’m not gonna say anymore. I’m gonna, I’m gonna let Chris guide me through it. Chris.
Gideon
Gets it. Chris will do it. Okay.
Geoffrey
I’m.
Chris
I’m hearing you, I’m hearing you.
Gideon
While you’re paused. Can I just say Dion and Dony? The Dony Earth and I think D.
Geoffrey
Dony. Okay.
Gideon
Somebody says Jew. I can’t remember who it was. D e w.
Shannon
Oh, I think that’s me.
Gideon
Can you say make it a liquid u d
Yeah. And one more thing you said deserve it and I think it’s deserved. It’s.
Shannon
Deserved. Yeah, yeah. After I said it, I was like, there’s too many syllables in the line.
Gideon
Yeah, that’s right. You had ended up with an.
Geoffrey
That’s, that’s a good, that’s a good sign though. I mean, we, we all do it occasionally. It’s a good sign that you can actually hear yourself getting the rhythm slightly wrong. Yeah. Let’s, let’s see, what is it? Six 20. Let’s just, let’s just take like a three minute break. ’cause I need to get a drink of water and, and, and come back. And that’ll give us, you know, 15 minutes or so and we’ll finish this up. We’ll go, we’ll, we’ll start to go through it again. We’re not gonna go through the whole thing. We’ll, we’ll start to get through it again. How about that? Does that sound good? Good.
Sounds good. Okay, great. I’ll be right back.
I was looking at it. Oh, it’s like, how, it’s like the computer. Oh, I can’t do that, Dave.
Excuse me. Oh God. What’s going on out there? I don’t,
I mean, I assume something’s on fire because No, no, it’s absolutely beautiful. Yes, it is. I just drinking too fast.
I also misread the time. I thought we had less time than we have. So, so we have, let’s, let’s go through this again.
I think just one other thing I wanted to
put in your head, Shannon, God almighty, this is funny because I was gonna just remind you of her actual physical condition, especially in the, in the second, the bug. You frighten me with that, all that scene.
And, and also just put in your mind that the death of maximi of Maxius, Maus, maus Ma Yeah. Sorry, I’m thinking of Funny thing happened away. The form of maus is, is also, is also news to you. So, I mean, her Hermione keeps getting
slapped with these things that she didn’t know about.
So the, the, I mean, it’s an interesting line to tread particularly for a, a modern day actress to keep her strength, her, her sort of spiritual, and, you know, her inner strength is there all the time. That’s, that’s who she is.
It’s also her position. She’s a queen. She’s the daughter of the empress of Russia. She’s not, you know, she’s not just anybody. She is,
and again, in, in the worldview, she deserves to be there. This is not, there’s nothing at all weak about her, but she is physically compromised, just physically as, as a person, as a human being, as a woman. Both in that first scene and, and certainly in the second one.
So I I, I perhaps something to explore, make her your own. But I, I think there’s something about her that’s not, it’s not resigned. ’cause that sounds weak. It sounds like she’s giving into something, but it, it’s, it’s, I can’t think of a better word, but, but, but she is, she is secure in her power and her knowledge and her faith, which, which is all a thing. It’s, it’s pre-Christian, but there’s still, you know, faith in, in her, you know, the, the, what’s the deal in Latin, I remember virtue, you talk about a man having virtue, and I remember our Latin teacher always had to explain that doesn’t mean virtuous in the sense that we think of it because virtue what we think of as virtue nowadays is a, is a Christian idea. But, but maybe you can help me out here. But, and it’s not just masculine, but it, it’s a quality of, of strength, of goodness, of.
Gideon
Heroism.
Geoffrey
Of heroism, of manliness, manliness, manliness. But I speak all those things. But now speaking in a perhaps capital or small f fem feminine way, you know, the, the nurturer, the gatherer, the, the mother, all of those, all those good things, that’s, that strength is there. That’s a given with Hermione.
Gideon
I, I just wanna add to that, that in the first scenes, she is filled with vitality and Witt as well. And there those things are still there, the virtue’s there. And she, and Shakespeare makes the point of it in, in the way they joke. But she’s also got all that life energy that in these scenes is a sapped by the pregnancy and in the next scene, sapped by having given birth.
Geoffrey
Absolutely. Again, which gives us this great duality. I mean, she’s, she’s a fun person to be around. She’s not, she’s not some legal, regal removed, cold, statuesque person. She’s, she’s great. And they say again and again, she’s the reason that ese stayed. You know, she, she’s, she’s a great hostess. She’s fun to be around.
So.
Gideon
She’s a good match for the wa for the way Leon’s is before he goes bonkers.
Geoffrey
Exactly. So, so the, there are all those things, the, the, and I’m not saying that you did, but, but
ss sh just drop the, the feeling of anger from your acting vocabulary at all.
There are o other ways of, of conveying that.
But, but look for that interesting dichotomy of, of, in the, in the first scene strength. And again, the first, the very first thing you say is, what do you, is this a joke you sporting? Are, are we still playing? What, what, what’s going on?
J Just be aware of those interesting dichotomies that are, that are happening in her. That’s all. And, and let’s start again. And I’m gonna urge both of you at this point to slow down. Really take your time. Really take your time. There’s no feel, no obligation to get through this in any way. And, and let the punctuation again. I think, I think it’s good in this, in this edition, let the punctuation be your friend, really observe it.
Chris
Yep.
Geoffrey
This time. So I will once again do everybody who’s not you two,
okay.
Chris
Was he met there? His train camillo with him.
Geoffrey
Behind the tuft of pines. I met them, never saw men scour. So on their way, I ied them even to their ships.
Chris
How blessed am I in my just censure in my true opinion, A lack for lesser knowledge. How Kirsten being so blessed, there may be in the cup a spider steeped and one may drink to depart and yet partake no venom, for his knowledge is not infected.
But if one present the abhorred ingredient to his eye, they known how he had drunk cracks. His gorge, his sides with violent hats.
I have drunk and seen the spider.
Camilo was his help in this, his pander. There is a plot against my life. My crown all’s true. That is mistrusted. That false villain who I employed was pre employed by him is discovered my design. And I remained a remain a pitched thing. Yay. A very trick for those to play at will.
How can the posts to be so easily open.
Geoffrey
By his great authority, which often have no less prevailed than so on your command?
Chris
I know it too. Well. Give me the boy. I am glad you did not nurse him though. He does bear some signs of me. Yet you have too much blood in him.
Shannon
What is this.
Chris
Sport? Bear the boy hands who shall not come about her away with him and let her sport herself with that. She’s big win. Butti es has made her, has made me swell dust.
Geoffrey
Good, good. Let’s stop a second just so you can get es.
Chris
Publicis. Sorry.
Geoffrey
It’s good. It’s good. Off to an excellent, excellent, excellent start. The, the one thing I wrote was when you said there may be that when you start the thing about the spider, that was terrific. It was like, it was like a new thought, you know? So all, every time there’s a new thought or a new energy, it’s great. I just, I’ve wrote that one down because it it it just came. So,
because it was, it was the first one,
Publicis. And here here’s what this line is, is a run on away with him and let her sport herself with that. She’s big with. And I think the, that is the operative word.
Chris
Gotcha. Right.
Gideon
I was gonna make the same note. It’s not that she’s sporting herself, it’s that she’s sporting herself with that child.
Geoffrey
That thing. But you can’t even, I mean, it’s a face to that. It’s a, yeah. It’s, it’s great. So you can, you know, it’s, it’s a very common word, but it’s, it, it’s, I don’t know. There’s, there’s this sort of deliciousness to it. Got it.
And, and here’s another one with that. She’s big with portis es has made her swell. Thus that’s again, there’s no break in that, in that thought.
So let’s just go back to give me the boy.
Chris
Okay.
Give me the boy. I’m glad you did not nurse him, but he does bear some signs of me. You have too much blood in him.
Shannon
What is this sports?
Chris
Bear the boy. Hence he shall not come about her away with him and let her support herself with that. She’s big with, but his es has made me swell dust.
Shannon
But I’d say he had not. And I’ll be sworn you would believe my saying how air you leaned to the nay word.
Chris
You my lords look on her mark her. Well be but about to say she’s a goodly lady. And the justice of your hearts will thereto add this pity. She’s not honest, honorable, praise her. But for this her without door form, which on my faith deserves high praise and straight the shrug, these petty brands that cow me use, oh, I’m out that mercy does. But cow me will see her virtue itself. These shrugs, these hums andhas. When you have said she’s come between, come, come between air, you can say she’s honest, but be it known from him that has most caused the grieve. It should be she’s an adulterous.
Geoffrey
Let’s, it’s good. Good. Well done. Let’s just, let’s just work your way through that speech again. ’cause it is, it’s, it’s, it’s tricky. And it’s tricky because his mind is all over the place. As, as we keep saying.
Gideon
Can I just make one suggestion? It’ll make it easier. Sure. Please. That phrase that mercy does it you mean that’s what mercy does, not alimy. So if you give a little more on that, it’s not that Mercy does, it’s, that’s what I see. Yeah.
Chris
Yep.
Gideon
Good. I think that’ll make it, that everything else was perfect about that I thought, but that, that then upended it. Good.
Chris
Okay. From from when
Can I hear from you my lords? Is that Yeah. The beginning of that? Yeah.
You my lord.
Geoffrey
I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’m just gonna say one more thing is again, as we, as we work, as we work through this, right? You know, obviously we’re working on this, we got three more weeks.
Be aware that in both these scenes, they’re both private and public. There’s, I mean, they are in public. There’s, there’s no denying there are the people around, and I’m not clear, there’s a whole, there’s certainly in this, in the, in the her, the sort of Hermione bug speech. There’s a lot of other people around. I’m not sure if it’s just a couple of, you know, antagonists and one other guy here, but still there are other people around. So you can, you can, as you work through it, you look for opportunities to where you’re almost talking in her ear or talking right to her and others where you go, you guys see this?
Can you see what’s going on here? Let me tell you a little, let me tell you about women. Right? And then you can have the opportunity to go back to her. It’s like you fucking whore. I know exactly what you did, right?
Chris
Yeah.
Geoffrey
That, that will feel free to use that as you want. But I think you can go as the scene goes on, I think you can go further and further with that. It’s like, can somebody, as you said, as you said earlier, Chris said, Hey, hey, is anybody listening to me? Anybody listening? Get the fuck outta here ya whore. Right? That that kind of in and out thing is another thing that, that sets people’s alarm bells off.
But
yeah. So start with you. My lords Yeah. Start from there.
Chris
You my lords look on her, mark her, well be but about to say she’s a goodly lady and the justice of your heart will thereto add his pity. She’s not honest, honorable.
Praise her butt for this her without door form, which on my faith deserves high speech and straight the shrug ha these petty brands that Calendly duck use.
And why know that mercy does, her calendy will see her virtue itself. These shrugs, these hums and haws. When you have said she’s goodly come between air, you can say she’s honest, honest, but be it known from him that has most cause to grieve. It should be she’s an adulterous.
Shannon
Should a villain say so the most replenished villain in the world, he were as much more villain. You my Lord do. But mistake.
Chris
You have mistook my lady, I listening is for Leons, for thou thing, which I’ll not call a creature of thy place. This barbarism making me the precedent. Should, I’m gonna stop here. Hell am I.
Geoffrey
Can I, can I just talk about this line for a second? Sure.
Gideon
Okay. So he is, he is going to the idea of not being able to distinguish between a prince and a beggar because all awareness of degrees, meaning hierarchy in the society are gone. Yeah. That’s what barbarism is going gonna do. If I talk to you like a queen, instead of calling you a thing, right? Oh, thou thing. I’m not even gonna call you a creature of your place, your place is is royalty. Right.
So that less barbarism, making an example of me abolishes all degrees of language and doesn’t distinguish between a prince and a beggar. So I have to distinguish between a prince and a beggar by calling you not a queen, but a thing. Okay.
I, that’s all a complicated way of saying that’s that’s what’s going on in his, his decision. He, he’s calls her a thing and then he realizes that’s not what he usually calls her. So he’s justifying why he is not calling her a creature of her place, which is her rank.
Chris
Got got, got it. Okay. Got it. I’m, I’m, yeah, you don’t need to know what’s going on in my brain.
Gideon
We will hear it in your voice.
Chris
No, I mean, I mean the actor’s brain, like, why I’m not seeing it.
Geoffrey
Oh, for god’s sake. It’s difficult. And what, what that means is you have a four line, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. You have a.
Gideon
Almost five and a half.
Geoffrey
Five, five and a half line parenthetical statement.
Chris
I know.
Geoffrey
It’s, it’s modifying that one word right, is is that right, Gideon? Yes.
Gideon
Exactly.
Geoffrey
So y you, I I you, I you, you can do it, but it’s just, you know, it’s a a matter of making that kind of shift in your thought. Yeah. And.
Gideon
It’s also then the shift. He says, you have mistook my lady ings for leonis. And then he says, oh, thou thing that’s to her. And then he goes through this long description of why he said that. And then he turns back to the group I have said is king, this is what’s happening. Right, right. So that goes public again.
Chris
Yeah. Yeah.
Geoffrey
It’s almost, it’s almost like a, it’s, it’s almost like a legal brief, you know?
Gideon
Right. I just.
Geoffrey
Word the first indictment. This is the second indictment. This is the, you know, first, first count of this, first count of that. So let’s, let’s give you a, a start if you’re ready with Hermione,
and it’s sounding terrific, Shannon, but give, give him the whole line. Should a
actually just go back one. So we make the whole line out of it. And, and nee I mean, I mean Leonis give her, she’s an adulterous.
And, and Oh, here we go. You probably hear my dog now.
Yeah. The more, the more I’m, I’m thinking now as I’ve heard you say it, the more sort of wonder you can get in there, the more of figuring out Right. The the better. Yeah. Okay, so let’s just start from Chris from, she’s an adulterous.
Chris
Okay.
She’s an adulterous.
Shannon
Could a villain say so the most replenished villain in the world, he were as much more villain. You my lord do. But mistake.
Chris
You have mistook my lady es for Leons. That thing, which I’ll not call a creature of that place. Listen, barbarism making me the precedent. Should a light language used to all degrees and mannerly distinguishment lead out the T and beggar. I have said she’s an adulterous. I have said with whom more she’s a traitor. And Camilo is aary wither and one that knows what she should shame to know herself, but with her most vile principle that she’s a bed swer, even as bad as those that vulgar give bogus titles a and privy to that, to this their latest escape.
Geoffrey
Okay, good. Good. Just gonna work you through that one again. Yeah. You’re gonna a hell of a workout. That was really good. That was really good.
Should like language used to all degrees and mannerly distinguishment leave out betw the prince and beggar.
Gideon
So the, the, the object what’s being left out is mannerly distinguishment. What’s being left out of between the prince and the beggar is mannerly. Distinguishment. It’s an inverted word order.
Chris
Yeah.
Geoffrey
So help yourself out, really observe that comma after degrees.
Gideon
Yes.
Geoffrey
And, and then make sure that whole, those next two lines are really knit together.
And mannerly, distinguishment leave out betw the prints and beggar.
Gideon
I just wanna add that a y and line one 15 is I Yes. Not a.
Geoffrey
That’s, that’s coming up.
Chris
I’m sorry. I, I copied and pasted the text so that I could have some room to write stuff.
Geoffrey
And, and line numbers didn’t come with it, so you’d have to be second.
Gideon
Oh. Oh. So it’s the next, the last line you just said.
Geoffrey
A bed swer. Even as bad as those that vulgar give boldest, bolded bold titles. I it’s, yes. And privy to this their latest.
He goes a little piratey there. Piratey.
Yeah. So all that stuff we had about manly ly distinguishment, betwixt the prince and beggar. Let that sink in. Before you move to, I have said she’s an adulterous. You you did. I just want you to really make a point that
she’s a bed. Is that your lovely wife behind you? Yes. My lovely wife has just come in. Sorry. There’s just one other thing here. A little And Camilo, a feder aary with her one that knows what she should shame to know herself, but with her most vile principle.
So.
Gideon
She would shame to know it even on her own or, or with only her most vile principle. Yes. Meaning.
Geoffrey
Yes. Yeah, that’s what I was about to say. Don’t don’t be misled by that. But it’s more like she should shame to know herself more like even, even with her most vile principle. Even.
Gideon
Only with Yes.
Geoffrey
Yeah. Even only with her most vile prints. So that that’s, that’s the feeling. It’s not an exception. It’s actually an amplification. Correct. So.
Gideon
We could use the word accept for it. Yeah. Except with her most vile. She, that’ll make it make sense.
Geoffrey
And this is another one where it, it’s great.
I i, let me go back to Hermione Shannon. I thought that was spot on. That’s, that’s the direction to go in. So more of that. Good. And last you you got through that great. Up until she’s a traitor. Camilla’s a feder with her and just to get that butt right. But it’s, it’s also interesting how the, as he goes on, it gets, it just gets worse and worse. I mean, bed swerve is a,
I don’t know, it’s a, what do I wanna say? It’s a richer image than saying she’s unfaithful or something.
Gideon
He said she’s an adulterous, which is a legal term. Yeah. Now he’s using a demonic. A a more popular vulgar term.
Geoffrey
Yes. A more vulgar. It. It’s, it’s that it, again, it’s that thing of jealousy and betrayal. You know, as you begin to think about it more, it gets worse and worse and sort of smellier and wormer. So that’s, it’s beginning to be reflected in his language, which is great.
So let’s, let’s just do that section again because it’s really coming along nicely.
Chris
Yeah. There’s another one of those. Like, he, he goes off for five lines and then comes back to.
Geoffrey
Y Yes. One 100%. He, he, he goes off down a little, a little corridor in his own mind and then Yeah. Snap back to his, his public self. But even then he begins to go down, even when he is talking to these, these guys, these lords, he, he chooses to use, he choose to get on a, a course path, let’s say.
Gideon
This is, this is characteristic of all these speeches that he keeps going off the rails. Yeah.
Geoffrey
And.
Gideon
That’s telling us that this, that he’s, he’s in the wrong and he’s trying to make it right and he can’t do it and he keeps losing it.
Chris
But I.
Geoffrey
In your world, you’re right. Okay, let’s go from That’s.
Gideon
The spirit.
Geoffrey
She’s, she’s an adulterous.
Chris
Do you mind if I just start a little bit, but be it known.
Geoffrey
Back up to where you want. Yeah. Be it known is good.
Chris
A little wind in for Yep.
Geoffrey
Yep.
Chris
Right. But be it known from him that has most cause to grieve. It should be She’s an adulterous.
Shannon
Should a villain say so the most replenished villain in the world, he were as much more villain.
You my lord do. But mistake.
Chris
You have mistook my lady es for leones of that thing, which I’ll not call a creature of thy place less barbarism and making me the precedent should alike language used to all degrees and mannerly distinguishment leave out between the, I’m gonna do that again. Good.
Got lost. Good.
Geoffrey
Since we’re, since we’re stopped. Since we’re stopped. Ex excellent use of mistook that that’s like, you know, turning her language on her. It’s great. That’s just the kind of thing we like. That’s Richard II kind of stuff, but a, a much more mature writer. Now can you give her a sh can you give him should a villain say so it’s love. Lovely. Yes, lovely. Shannon.
Shannon
Should a villain say so the most replenished villain in the world, he were as much more villain.
You my lord do. But mistake.
Chris
You have mistook my lady for Leon. Oh thou thing, which I’m not call a creature of thy place. Les Barbarism making me the precedent. Should a like language used to all degrees and mannerly distinguishment lead out betw the prince and beggar. I have said she’s an adulterous. I have said with whom more she’s a traitor. And Camillo is aary with her and one that knows what she should shame to know herself, but with her most vile principle that she’s a bed swer. Even as bad as those that vulgar give both titles I and privy to this their late escape.
Shannon
Oh, by my life privy to none of this. How will this grieve you? When you shall come to clearer knowledge that you thus have published me. Gentle my Lord, you scarce skin rip me throughly then to say you did mistake.
Chris
No. If I mistake in those foundations which I build upon the center is not big enough to bear a school voice top away with her to prison.
He who shall speak for her is a far off guilty. But that he speaks.
Shannon
There’s some ill planet reigns. I must be patient till the heavens look with an aspect more favorable. Good. My lords I am not prone to weeping as our sex commonly are the want of which vain do per chance shall dry your pities. But I have that honorable grief lodged here, which burns worse than tears, drown beseech you all my lords with thoughts, so qualified as your charities shall best instruct you, measure me. And so the kings will be performed.
Chris
Shall I be heard?
Shannon
Who is that? Goes with me. Be seat your highness. My women may be with me for you See, my plight requires it. Do not weep good fools. There is no cause. When you shall know your mistress has deserved prison, then abound in tears. As I come out this action I now go on is for my better grace. Aew, my Lord, I never wished to see you. Sorry. Now I trust I shall my women come. You have leave.
Chris
Go do our bidding. Hence.
Geoffrey
Good, good. Let’s, let’s go back a bit. Oh, that’s getting so good. Good. Is that Yeah, it’s, it’s terrific. It’s, it’s terrific really coming along very nicely. You were really getting carried away there, Chris. In the best, best possible way,
Shannon. Now I’m not gonna say, I’m gonna say the same thing to you. Just be aware of these lines that don’t stop at the ends. When you clear knowledge that you thus have the knowledge that you thus have published me, you scarce can write me thoroughly then to say you did mistake. There’s, there’s doesn’t have to be a break there.
And tell me what did that, what that means. You scarce can write me throughly than, than to say you did mistake.
Shannon
There’s this explanation of the art and the kind, like a half made sense to me.
Geoffrey
Go ahead, tell me what you, what you think.
Shannon
In my brain it is, even if you say you mistake, like you’re barely gonna squeak by in writing this situation.
Gideon
That’s right.
Geoffrey
Okay. That’s, that’s that seems right to me. I.
Gideon
Have it. I have the trick that you need, you need to hit then a little bit.
Shannon
Okay. Meaning.
Gideon
When you say you did mistake at that point, you will barely write me.
Do you get what I mean?
Shannon
Yeah. It’s, it’s, yes. Yes. Thanks. It’s a, it’s it’s word in a very tricky way to try to convey what I think it’s saying. But.
Geoffrey
Yes, it’s, it is difficult. But I i again, as, as we’ve said right from the beginning of this whole session, I i, if you set it outright, set it the way we’ve been setting you up, the way you’ve been setting up her and, and know what you’re saying, we’ll understand it. Even though when you parse it like this, it’s, it is, it’s a tricky, it’s, it’s a tricky little thing,
but there is no break between say and you did mistake. Yeah.
Same thing where I must be patient till the heavens look within a spec more favorable. Right.
I’m not prone to weeping as our sex commonly are. The one of which for feigned de shall, per shall the want of which Vaed dew per chance shall dry your pities. Right. Carry it all the way through her, her, I think in this case, it’s, her thoughts are actually smoother than his. Yes. So you can, that’s instead of seeing, instead of a person who’s wandering off all these corridors to keep my weak metaphor happening. She, she’s, she’s gliding through, she’s connecting this stuff. Right. So do, do connect it. And.
Gideon
I give you another metaphor for what you’re asking her to do. Sure. My favorite metaphor is, is bow and arrow shooting an air. When you start a sentence in Shakespeare, you’re shooting an arrow. And if you shoot it this way, it just bounces to the ground a few times. That’s what all those pauses are. So you have to go for the end of the thought and, and it, unless there’s punctuation, there’s no reason not to get to the end of the thought. And I have a few words I want to hear you make more of and I think it’s gonna help. Okay. Can I give those? Sure.
At line one 18, I think you need to give us more on grieve.
You’re predicting this and it’s the key. He’s, he’s not close to grieving for what he’s doing now, but you see, you foresee that he will. So that’s one
I talked about. Then
I have honorable, oh, I have that honorable grief lodged here. You mean your breast in your heart. So here needs to be a little more, and then I think you can bring out the word charities in 1 37. You’re talking to the others and what are you asking them to judge you by a very particular Christian quality, which is caritas the selfless love of your neighbor. Right. Christian charity.
Charity comes from the word care from the word caritas, which means to care.
So she’s calling them them to do that. And then
you paused after my women in front 1 41 Beecher Highness, my women. And then you took a breath. That may have just been ’cause you were out of breath, but that, that’s not a pause there either. Yeah. Okay. That’s it. That’s, those are my notes.
Geoffrey
We’re we’re nearly done. And I think, we’ll, we will stop here. But I i, I do wanna say that I, I just love the word charities and I don’t know if you, if you, Shannon and Chris, you remember this, but
in Crucible, I loved how often the word charity came up because in the King James Bible, which was their bible, and I, I hope I pointed this out at some point, the the three things that remain are faith, hope, and charity in the, in the modern translations, they make it love, which is, I think that a less rich word. So here’s a perfect example of, of that charity used in that sense of that more.
Gideon
Comes from the Greek agape. That’s what.
Geoffrey
Yeah, exactly. That, that particular brand of love. So I’m, I’m glad you brought that out.
I think we’re, oh, it is, it’s seven o’clock. So we will, we will stop. I’ll, I’ll send you all emails. This was Oh, such a pleasure for me. And I, I hope, I hope you’re enjoying it. We’ll get real antigens in here next week. There’s Amelia for everybody to wave at.
The dog hasn’t made a sound, which is nice.
And and we’ll keep going through it this way and do go through it. I, I think you’re, you’re both very generously picking up on what I, I and I think Gideon are hoping a little more for.
Gideon
I wanna just say it’s the, your response to our notes has been great and it just.
Geoffrey
Gets.
Gideon
Richer and richer as you go. So.
Geoffrey
It’s nice to work, nice to work with pros. Yes. So I’m gonna sign off. I’m done. Nathan, you have something to say?
Nathan
No, no. I just wanted to come back and, and say thank you guys again. It was, it was, I’ve been listening the entire time, I promise. And I’ve just really enjoyed the co the discussion and conversation and you know, you, you know, it’s a dense play, but you don’t really know it until you ha have to examine every line. And it’s, it, it’s just great to, to get a little more clarity. Even me, you know, just like, what, what, what is he saying? You know, you have a general sense of the arc, but it, it’s wonderful. So thank you guys so much for diving into this so fully. Thanks.
Geoffrey
Good. And, and we will, we will continue with that. We’ll use both those scenes. So you, you, you get something a little more meaty, Shannon. It, I think altogether it’ll only run about 10 or 12 minutes.
Nathan
So Yeah, no, you, you, you were kind of under time. You know it, on average you were under time from some of the other scenes, so you got, you, you got room to spare, so.
Geoffrey
Excellent. Excellent. Yeah.
Nathan
Yeah.
Geoffrey
Thanks everyone. Thank you. Same time, same place next week.
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