#Back in high school I was playing Tranio in The Taming of the Shrew

[allieinarden]

A dirge for those whose lifetime greatest one-liner occurred under circumstances too specific to explain without a PowerPoint.

[troyergo]

The Alley Theatre’s production of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew premieres Thursday, March 14, at the Anderson Museum of Art.

The production takes classic Shakespeare and gives it a narrative twist, recounting the story of love and trickery underneath a big- top tent.

The comedy follows a plucky Lucentio in his pursuit of Bianca, a fair woman who cannot marry until her head-strong older sister, Katherine, finds a suitor. Lucentio encourages the rich man Petruchio to woo Katherine and in turn free Bianca to marry.

Directed by Kay Winter, an AU alum and teacher at Anderson High School, the presentation of the material has shifted focus away from the traditional theme of feminine discipline toward one of personal betterment.

“I wanted people to come to watch this and not think of it as a play about a man ‘taming’ a woman,” Winter says. “I wanted them to come and see it as I believe Shakespeare intended it to be—that all the characters in the play are reinventing themselves in one way or another.”

The addition of the circus environment emphasizes this theme of self-discovery. As Winter says the circus “is the one place where anyone can become anything they want to be.”

“Things have changed with the #MeToo movement,” Winter says. “I wanted to make sure that the audience could really tell that this isn’t about dominating another person—this is about reinventing yourself.”

Winter says that a local performance can provide an escape from campus.

“The Alley Theatre is an awesome experience for students to get away from campus and work with people who aren’t just AU people.” Winter says. “It extends their theatre family.”

The show is comprised of a local cast that ranges from first-time actors to seasoned professionals, and stars two AU students, Juli Biagi as Bianca and Isaac Derkach as Tranio. The show marks the first role in a Shakespeare play for the junior musical theatre majors.

“It’s been hard, of course, because it’s not language that we use nowadays,” says Biagi. “As you know what you’re talking about it makes it that much more exciting.”

Biagi said that the show represents and encourages women to be who they truly are.

“Putting on this show is actually empowering for women to be who they naturally are,” says Biagi. “I think it’s really interesting to learn the different ways that we’re making the show our own. It has been a really fun experience.”

Participating in Anderson community theatre has provided opportunities to grow and connect with thespians of varying ages and backgrounds, a striking contrast to productions put on at the university.

For Biagi, being involved with the Alley Theatre has exposed her to talented people who volunteer their time to the arts.

“Learning by experience from others is enriching my experience here,” says Biagi.

In addition to the Shakespeare roles, each actor has been assigned a complimenting circus role. For Tranio, played by Derkach, the trait of quick-witted deceit will be characterized through the sleight-of-hand of a magician.

“With the idea of a magician in mind, it gives Tranio a new life to me,” says Derkach. “It makes him more than just a servant. He is someone who is willing to go the extra mile for their best friend.”

Derkach said that the artistic location of the performance adds a different perspective.

“The museum is one of the most gorgeous performance venues that I’ve ever been in,” says Derkach. “There is the big dome and there is photography everywhere, so having the big loud colors of our production juxtaposed with all this photography that we’re surrounded by is just really visually appealing and cool to be part of.”

Derkach has worked with the Alley Theatre in the past, providing dramaturgy for last season’s production of Yasmina Reza’s Art directed by David Coolidge.

The job involved breaking down the script, contextualizing the history and identifying running themes for the cast and crew members of the show.

The theatre is an arm of Central Christian Church in downtown Anderson and has been in operation since 2014. Hosting a production of Shakespeare at the museum has been the traditional season closer for the company, harkening back to its first production, Macbeth.

Rick Vale is the artistic director of the company and plays the role of Bianca’s father Baptista. In April, Vale will be directing the Boze Lyric Theatre’s production of Marc Camoletti’s Boeing, Boeing at Byrum Hall.

This season has seen an increased collaboration between AU and the Alley Theatre, primarily through the cast of students, which included Sam Lynch and Skyla Bruno in William Inge’s Picnic in February. This is the product of the intentional professional relationship between both organizations coordinated by Vale and Coolidge.

“This year we made sure that students were available to audition,” says Vale, a retired professional actor from Seattle. “That has opened up a door that has been really great for us. It has been a very positive relationship. I’m just sorry that they have to go to school. If I could get them out of class, I could work with them all the time.”

When moving to the Midwest, Vale had not anticipated the activity or caliber of community theatre in the small city of Anderson, Indiana.

“It is surprising the amount of talent that is here,” he says. “Everybody who comes to theatre either here or at Mainstage is astounded by the high quality.”

The Taming of the Shrew marks the end of the Alley’s fifth season that began in November, which has been a season celebrating female directors.

The premiere of The Taming of the Shrew will be at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 14. AU students with valid ID can purchase discounted tickets for price $5. The regular price of admission per ticket is $10.

Additional showtimes will be at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, March 15, and Saturday, March 16, with a final matinee show at 3 p.m. on Sunday, March 17.

Vol. 76, No. 13 Andersonian Mar. 13, 2019

[zeroviraluniverse-blog]

15 Antiquated Words for 'Happy' We Should Bring Back

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15 Antiquated Words for 'Happy' We Should Bring Back

William Shakespeare devised new words and countless plot tropes that still appear in everyday life. Famous quotes from his plays are easily recognizable; phrases like “To be or not to be,” “wherefore art thou, Romeo,” and “et tu, Brute?” instantly evoke images of wooden stages and Elizabethan costumes. But an incredible number of lines from his plays have become so ingrained into modern vernacular that we no longer recognize them as lines from plays at all. Here are 21 phrases you use but may not have known came from the Bard of Avon.

1. “WILD GOOSE CHASE” // ROMEO AND JULIET, ACT II, SCENE IV

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“Nay, if our wits run the wild-goose chase, I am done, for thou hast more of the wild-goose in one of thy wits than, I am sure, I have in my whole five. Was I with you there for the goose?” — Mercutio

This term didn’t originally refer to actual geese, but rather a type of horse race.

2. “GREEN-EYED MONSTER” // OTHELLO, ACT III, SCENE III

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“O, beware, my lord, of jealousy! It is the green-eyed monster, which doth mock the meat it feeds on.” — Iago

Before Shakespeare, the color green was most commonly associated with illness. Shakespeare turned the notion of being sick with jealousy into a metaphor that we still use today.

3. “PURE AS THE DRIVEN SNOW” // HAMLET, ACT III, SCENE I AND THE WINTER’S TALE, ACT IV, SCENE IV

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“Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, go.” — Hamlet

“Lawn as white as driven snow.” — Autolycus

Though Shakespeare never actually used the full phrase “pure as the driven snow,” both parts of it appear in his work. For the record, this simile works best right after the snow falls, and not a few hours later when tires and footprints turn it into brown slush.

4. “SEEN BETTER DAYS” // AS YOU LIKE IT, ACT II, SCENE VII

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“True is it that we have seen better days and have with holy bell been knolled to church, and sat at good men’s feasts and wiped our eyes of drops that sacred pity hath engendered.” — Duke Senior

The first recorded use of “seen better days” actually appeared in Sir Thomas More in 1590, but the play was written anonymously, and is often at least partially attributed to Shakespeare. We do know Shakespeare was a fan of the phrase; he uses “seen better days” in As You Like It, and then again in Timon of Athens.

5. “OFF WITH HIS HEAD” // RICHARD III, ACT III, SCENE IV

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“If? Thou protector of this damnèd strumpet, talk’st thou to me of “ifs”? Thou art a traitor—Off with his head.” — Richard III

The Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland wasn’t the first monarch with a penchant for liberating heads from bodies. Her famous catchphrase came from Shakespeare first.

6. “FOREVER AND A DAY” // AS YOU LIKE IT, ACT IV, SCENE I

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“Now tell me how long you would have her after you have possessed her.” — Rosalind

“Forever and a day” — Orlando

We have the Bard to thank for this perfect fodder for Valentine’s Day cards and middle school students’ love songs.

7. “GOOD RIDDANCE” // TROILUS AND CRESSIDA, ACT II, SCENE I

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[Thersites exits]

“A good riddance.” — Patroclus

Where would Green Day be without Shakespeare’s riposte? In addition to acoustic ballad titles, “good riddance” also applies well to exes, house pests (both human and insect), and in-laws.

8. “FAIR PLAY” // THE TEMPEST, ACT V, SCENE I

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“Yes, for a score of kingdoms you should wrangle, and I would call it fair play.” — Miranda

Prospero’s daughter never would have been able to predict that “fair play” is used more often now in sports than it is for the negotiation of kingdoms.

9. “LIE LOW” // MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING, ACT V, SCENE I

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“If he could right himself with quarreling, some of us would lie low.” — Antonio

Shakespeare’s plays contain brilliant wisdom that still applies today. In “lie low,” he concocted the perfect two-word PR advice for every celebrity embroiled in a scandal.

10. “IT’S GREEK TO ME” // JULIUS CAESAR, ACT I, SCENE II

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“Nay, an I tell you that, Ill ne’er look you i’ the face again: but those that understood him smiled at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me.” — Casca

“It’s all Greek to me” might possibly be the most intelligent way of telling someone that you have absolutely no idea what’s going on.

11. “AS GOOD LUCK WOULD HAVE IT” // THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, ACT III, SCENE V

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“As good luck would have it, comes in one Mistress Page; gives intelligence of Ford’s approach; and, in her invention and Ford’s wife’s distraction, they conveyed me into a buck-basket.” — Falstaff

Determining whether a Shakespeare play is a comedy or a tragedy can largely be boiled down to whether good luck would have anything for the characters.

12. “YOU’VE GOT TO BE CRUEL TO BE KIND” // HAMLET, ACT III, SCENE IV

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“So, again, good night. I must be cruel only to be kind. Thus bad begins and worse remains behind.” — Hamlet

Here’s an idiom that proves just because a character in a Shakespeare play said it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s always true. Hamlet probably isn’t the best role model, especially given the whole accidentally-stabbing-someone-behind-a-curtain thing.

13. “LOVE IS BLIND” // THE MERCHANT OF VENICE, ACT II, SCENE VI

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“But love is blind, and lovers cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit, for if they could Cupid himself would blush to see me thus transformèd to a boy.” — Jessica

Chaucer actually wrote the phrase (“For loue is blynd alday and may nat see”) in The Merchant’s Tale in 1405, but it didn’t become popular and wasn’t seen in print again until Shakespeare wrote it down. Now, “love is blind” serves as the three-word explanation for any seemingly unlikely couple.

14. “BE-ALL, END-ALL” // MACBETH, ACT I, SCENE VII

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“If the assassination could trammel up the consequence, and catch with his surcease success; that but this blow might be the be-all and the end-all here, but here, upon this bank and shoal of time, we’d jump the life to come.” — Macbeth

Macbeth uses the phrase just as he’s thinking about assassinating King Duncan and, ironically, as anyone who’s familiar with the play knows, the assassination doesn’t turn out to be the “end all” after all.

15. “BREAK THE ICE” // THE TAMING OF THE SHREW, ACT I, SCENE II

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“If it be so, sir, that you are the man must stead us all, and me amongst the rest, and if you break the ice and do this feat, achieve the elder, set the younger free for our access, whose hap shall be to have her will not so graceless be to be ingrate.” — Tranio (as Lucentio)

If you want to really break the ice, the phrase appears to have come from Thomas North, whose translation of Plutarch’s Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans provided much of the inspiration for Shakespeare’s ancient word plays. This is a great meta “did you know” fact for getting to know someone at speed dating.

16. “HEART OF GOLD” // HENRY V, ACT IV, SCENE I

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“The king’s a bawcock, and a heart of gold, a lad of life, an imp of fame, of parents good, of fist most valiant.” — Pistol

Turns out, the phrase “heart of gold” existed before Douglas Adams used it as the name of the first spaceship to use the Infinite Improbability Drive in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

17. “KILL WITH KINDNESS” // THE TAMING OF THE SHREW, ACT IV, SCENE 1

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“This is a way to kill a wife with kindness, and thus I’ll curb her mad and headstrong humor.” — Petruchio

The Shakespeare canon would contain a lot fewer dead bodies if his characters all believed they should kill their enemies with kindness instead of knives and poison.

18. “KNOCK, KNOCK! WHO’S THERE?” // MACBETH, ACT II, SCENE III

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“Knock, knock! Who’s there, in th’ other devil’s name?” — Porter

Though high school students suffering through English class may disagree, Shakespeare was a master of humor in his works, writing both slapstick comedy and sophisticated wordplay. And, as the Porter scene in Macbeth illustrates, he’s also the father of the knock-knock joke.

19. “LIVE LONG DAY” // JULIUS CAESAR, ACT I, SCENE I

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“To towers and windows, yea, to chimney tops, your infants in your arms, and there have sat the livelong day with patient expectation to see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome.” — Mureless

Today, the phrase “live long day” is pretty much exclusively reserved for those who have been working on the railroad.

20. “YOU CAN HAVE TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING” // AS YOU LIKE IT, ACT IV, SCENE I

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“Why then, can one desire too much of a good thing?— Come, sister, you shall be the priest and marry us.—Give me your hand, Orlando.—What do you say, sister?” — Rosalind

Modern readers often call Shakespeare a visionary, far ahead of his time. For example: he was able to write about desiring too much of a good thing 400 years before chocolate-hazelnut spread was widely available.

21. “THE GAME IS AFOOT” // HENRY V, ACT III, SCENE I

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“The game’s afoot: follow your spirit, and upon this charge cry ‘God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'” — King Henry V

Nope! It wasn’t Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who coined this phrase—Sherlock Holmes’ most famous catchphrase comes from Henry V, although both characters do often tend to find themselves around dead bodies.