A Million Different Quinces

            In many English classes throughout my Regis career, I have felt that the in-class textual analysis was focused on one or two central themes, and the discussions that followed almost strictly stuck to those themes.  While reading Dubliners, we focused on the imprisoning and stifling setting of Ireland; while reading Frankenstein we focused on the danger of knowledge and the idea of appearance.  In this class, however, while guided in discussions focused on central themes, we held the reins, and our assignments fully captured the freedom we had in the class.  Our A Midsummer Night’s Dream paper had five prompts, each representing an essential theme, but we always had the option of creating a prompt of our own.  The Hamlet paper also had very few guidelines—while we had to include certain elements, almost every aspect of the production was ours to create, including the setting, the stage directions, the actors, etc.  The final project capped off what was a very experimental and exhilarating trimester.  Through actually being able to direct a scene, we fully embodied the ideas of personal poetic interpretation and textual analysis, while being able to create art!  In fact, other than the drive to get a good grade, a very important incentive existed with the final project: the want to entertain!  I worked hard memorizing my lines and stage directions so that those who viewed my scene would feel joy and would laugh at my drunken antics, and while reciting lines over and over wasn’t necessarily fun, the license to create a set and design costumes and set the lighting was definitely a great experience.

Yet what was even more amazing than the design of the mechanics of the production was the lead-up to the performance.  Initially practicing my lines, I thought of Mr. Milea and his portrayal of Quince as nervous and jittery. Stupidly trying to emulate him, I almost completely copied his style of performance.  Luckily I soon realized I possessed neither the skill nor the personality to put on such a performance, so I changed my outlook.  I started to have fun with it, and only after reciting prologue after prologue in various voices while wearing various costumes did I realize that there really existed infinite different Quinces, all of whom would be perfect for the production.  I tried the stupid Quince, one who had no idea how to speak correctly or monitor volume (as I wore baggy pants and a dunce hat).  I tried the quiet and intelligent yet out-of-place Quince by wearing a neat shirt and tie and speaking softly and slowly.  The beauty of the whole thing was that one Quince wasn’t objectively better than the next, yet I had the power to choose which I wanted my rendition of A Midsummer Night’s Dream to portray (so I picked the drunken Quince, naturally).  And after my performance, I spoke to Mr. Milea and as I told him how our Quinces were very different, his simple response was a fitting culmination, I believe, of our Shakespeare class.  His response, while I do not remember the exact words, was along the lines of, “Yeah, they were different, but it’s all the better that way!”

            As cliché as it sounds, it was this very subjectivity that allowed me to appreciate the idea of perspective not just within the theater, but also how it relates to the world at large.  And while there was no single moment or assignment that particularly catalyzed this revelation, the class, slowly through performance and close reading, taught me to think in different ways, to try to comprehend the meanings of plays from different angles, and to have the open-mindedness to accept other people’s views of these timeless masterpieces.  I’m happy that I didn’t steal Mr. Milea’s execution of Quince’s prologue, just as I was happy and entertained to see the other groups conduct their own forms of Shakespeare plays that I would not have imagined myself.  For example, Brit O’Daly’s crazed and contemporary “to be or not to be” soliloquy, using a chalkboard and Siri, was quite original, and this originally made the performance so great and memorable.

To prove this idea of perspective, I have added two clips, two starkly different performances of Hamlet’s “what a piece of work is a man” speech.  While the clips stand in such contrast, I believe that both are beautiful and telling portrayals of Hamlet’s character and are central to the overall meaning of the production, a testament to how there is no single correct way to portray any Shakespeare play, and that the differences in performance make Shakespeare's work so telling and entertaining.