Data Type：production background
Author：Horstkotte, Hinrich
Title：Director's Notes: My Experiences (So Far) in Directing the Midsummer Night's Dream in Taiwan (5.8.2004)
Source：A Midsummer Night's Dream Performance Program
Place：Kaohsiung
Publisher：Spring Wind Art Theatre [Nanfeng jutuan]
Date：2004/9
Pages：8
Language：English
Abstract：In collaborating with the Spring Wind Art Theatre, the director chose A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a play that he knows well and has directed twice before. Due to the language barrier, directing is focused on physical performance. Some elements have been modified to bring the play closer to the Taiwanese audience. Eastern theatrical traditions are added as well.
I was thrilled, when I got the invitation to direct a play in Taiwan, since I have been interested especially in Asian theatre traditions since I started to think about becoming a director. In my home town, Berlin, I have seen several guest performances of the different forms of China Opera as well as the Chinese Puppet- and Shadow-Theatre, and this has been a strong influence on my work at home. The stage designer, Joshan Liang, and I have been classmates at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, and I think, it was her, who had the idea of inviting me here. We chose Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, because it is a play, which is very familiar to me in having directed it already two times so far (in 2001 for the Salzburg Marionette Theatre, a production which has been, since then, traveling around the world). By the same time, I think, there is a string relationship between the world of Shakespeare and especially the Asian theatre world, with all their dedication to strong stories, brought to a clear form and in showing all the variety of comic and tragic subjects that theatre owns. I also think, it is a good choice for a mixed company of professional and semiprofessional players, some of them experienced, some less, because in the Midsummer Night’s Dream all the characters, even the smallest ones, are described and handled with great clarity. And, by the way, there is no real “Main role” as there are no real “Supporting roles”, each of them is as important, as the other one, even if there are differences in the number of words or scene each character has. I always loved the Midsummer Night’s Dream for being a wonderful example for a perfectly structured play in terms of rhythm and the variety of styles (if you think of the different groups of characters, the Noblemen, the Fairies, the Lovers and the Mechanicals).
Being one month in Taiwan now, and having rehearsed almost the whole play for a first time, I would say, this interpretation (because every attempt to approach a Shakespeare’s play in all its variety can be no more than an interpretation) of the “Dream” is concentrated strongly on physical terms, especially (of course) because I cannot (yet?) speak nor understand the Chinese language. Because of that I, together with the actors, had to find a way of acting, that can make clear all the different moods and colours, Shakespeare offers in his play. This is, of course, important not only, because I don’t speak Chinese, but also, because, having worked on Shakespeare’s text very detailed, I have the impression, that some typical things about Shakespeare’s language can hardly be translated to the Chinese. Transferring Shakespeare to another language is always difficult, as it is to transfer Shakespeare to another time. Shakespeare was a writer for the present time of his days. His plays have been performed in those days, as long, as the audience liked them. When a play was known to everybody, a new one was offered. Because of that, Shakespeare’s plays are full of allusions at his present time or at songs, limericks, poems, that have been used in Shakespeare’s everyday-life. I believe, that it is our duty to try to give the audience of today an impression of what an auditor in Shakespeare’s time could have felt while watching one of his plays. I do not believe in handling plays as artworks for or from a museum, which you look at and think “this is beautiful, but does not belong to my present world anymore”. Handling Shakespeare in a traditional way works perfectly well in his native land, as the wonderful Globe company proves nowadays, even though the present English is quite different from Shakespeare’s language. But transferring Shakespeare to another language, and, in our present case, to another continent with another cultural background, makes it rather difficult to get close to the audiences feelings, like Shakespeare (in his time) did. Because of that, we decided to substitute some of his songs, poems, limericks, folk rhymes, even names, by terms, that are more familiar to a Taiwanese audience. And the audience may forgive me, if I dare to add some of the typical movements of the east Asian theatre (especially in the Fairies’ scenes) to our production (being completely aware of the fact, that these gestures originally part of a tradition, which asks for perfect command of them, such as Shakespeare does, in terms of the English language).
In this kind of research, all the actors have been (and still are) wonderful partners, because of their curiosity and neverending energy. I think, we share here a very special adventure trip, a trip to the world of the Elizabethan renaissance, but also a trip (for me) to the way of acting, moving and thinking of the people of your country, which are, and this is quite a surprise for me, much closer to the habits of my home, than I have thought before.
Being one month in Taiwan now, and having rehearsed almost the whole play for a first time, I would say, this interpretation (because every attempt to approach a Shakespeare’s play in all its variety can be no more than an interpretation) of the “Dream” is concentrated strongly on physical terms, especially (of course) because I cannot (yet?) speak nor understand the Chinese language. Because of that I, together with the actors, had to find a way of acting, that can make clear all the different moods and colours, Shakespeare offers in his play. This is, of course, important not only, because I don’t speak Chinese, but also, because, having worked on Shakespeare’s text very detailed, I have the impression, that some typical things about Shakespeare’s language can hardly be translated to the Chinese. Transferring Shakespeare to another language is always difficult, as it is to transfer Shakespeare to another time. Shakespeare was a writer for the present time of his days. His plays have been performed in those days, as long, as the audience liked them. When a play was known to everybody, a new one was offered. Because of that, Shakespeare’s plays are full of allusions at his present time or at songs, limericks, poems, that have been used in Shakespeare’s everyday-life. I believe, that it is our duty to try to give the audience of today an impression of what an auditor in Shakespeare’s time could have felt while watching one of his plays. I do not believe in handling plays as artworks for or from a museum, which you look at and think “this is beautiful, but does not belong to my present world anymore”. Handling Shakespeare in a traditional way works perfectly well in his native land, as the wonderful Globe company proves nowadays, even though the present English is quite different from Shakespeare’s language. But transferring Shakespeare to another language, and, in our present case, to another continent with another cultural background, makes it rather difficult to get close to the audiences feelings, like Shakespeare (in his time) did. Because of that, we decided to substitute some of his songs, poems, limericks, folk rhymes, even names, by terms, that are more familiar to a Taiwanese audience. And the audience may forgive me, if I dare to add some of the typical movements of the east Asian theatre (especially in the Fairies’ scenes) to our production (being completely aware of the fact, that these gestures originally part of a tradition, which asks for perfect command of them, such as Shakespeare does, in terms of the English language).
In this kind of research, all the actors have been (and still are) wonderful partners, because of their curiosity and neverending energy. I think, we share here a very special adventure trip, a trip to the world of the Elizabethan renaissance, but also a trip (for me) to the way of acting, moving and thinking of the people of your country, which are, and this is quite a surprise for me, much closer to the habits of my home, than I have thought before.
