Well good morning, everyone. -Morning -I
want to first introduce myself and then
we'll go around round-robin and
introduce ourselves and our connection
to The Public Theater. My name is Karen
Ann Daniels, I am the director of the
Mobile Unit for The Public Theater which
tours plays twice a year throughout the
five boroughs of New York. And usually
it's Shakespeare, and so hence this
conversation today and I'm gonna pass it
over to Danaya. Hi I'm Danaya Esperanza,
I'm in Tampa, Florida and I've been
three Public shows, two of them have been
the Mobile Unit and I'm cast as Imogen
in CYMBELINE in our next Mobile Unit
which will hopefully be happening soon.
-My name is Stephanie Roth Haberle and
I'm in Montclair, New Jersey where I live
and I did a production of CYMBELINE two
decades ago at this point, playing Imogen
in the park at the Delacorte. And then
and now I'm going to play with Danaya
in the Mobile Unit production of
CYMBELINE playing the Queen and
Bellarius so I'm very excited to come
full circle with that. -I am Kate Burton
and I'm in Los Angeles, California
and four five years ago in 2015 at the
Delacorte and Shakespeare in the Park
I played the Queen and Belarius,
directed by Dan Sullivan. -Thank you all
for being here to just hang out and have
this conversation. You know as we stated
that we were originally before the
COVID, we were planning to do CYMBELINE in the
spring and we're postponing that now.
Hopefully to the fall and you know I
realized that CYMBELINE is one of those
plays that not everybody has either
heard of or seen out of you know
Shakespeare's canon, so one of those
things I'd love to talk about but I also
really love to talk about why
Shakespeare is something that that we do
whether that's you know in the park...
But it really feels like in the U.S.
especially, we've kind of like taken our
own ownership over William Shakespeare
and patched ourselves to him in a very
particular way so I guess my thought my
question really is just why do we do we
all think that Shakespeare is something
that is has survived so much and and I
think so deeply in American life. One of
those things I'd love to talk about but
I also really love to talk about why
Shakespeare is something that that we do
whether that's you know in the park but
it really feels like in the U.S.
especially we've kind of like taken our
own ownership over William Shakespeare
and patched ourselves to him in a very
particular way so I guess my thought my
question really is just why do we do we
all think that Shakespeare is something
that is has survived so much and I think
so deeply in American life. There are
several times actually in the past
couple of years that I've seen
productions of certain plays and I've
said this place should never be done
again and then I see another production
such as the Mobile Unit's MEASURE FOR
MEASURE and then I say this play can
only be done he's done this way because
this is this reveals the true the truth
in the play and I think that that that's
for me that's why I do Shakespeare now
is to reveal the truth that he had to
hide in a lot of ways.
And that is so political, so relevant and
is easily hid because he was good at
hiding it. But if we can find those
truths that he was trying to tell
society and and tell tell us and then if
we can tell those truths then I think
that that's that's the goal for me.
That's that's what that's the point of
doing them if we keep doing you know
like if we keep doing OTHELLO and OTHELLO keeps being the bad Black guy
then what then we have to stop doing
hello right like how do we tell the
truth of this that oh this is
this is really about how we see the
other and how we make them into monsters.
Like what what truth are we telling is
it just to speak great language. No I
don't think so
and that's what every time I I go and I
really I've learned that in seeing
different productions and and and
feeling like, oh this this is this just
told me a new story that's just I just
let's just reveal something for me as
opposed to um this is you know this is
beautiful language and it is beautiful
language but what what is it really what
is he really trying to get it's fun you
know from the lens of like the Mobile
Unit when you're sitting in a Mobile
Unit audience to see how Shakespeare
suddenly went from being like this thing,
you know your teacher made you do in
school or you heard about them but then
you thought oh that's too the language is
weird. But suddenly see that the language and the
action married right in front of you, how
that all of a sudden it's like oh, this
is funny, this is amazing, or I've I've
lived that moment in some way. Like that
that thing is to see people engage with him
for the first time and really see. I
think all of these things that you're
talking about which is the humanity of
it and that you know we can really sort
of place him in many different contexts,
and suddenly he just as real to us. And
the and those stories are real which
kind of make what makes me want to move
into sort of talking about the play
CYMBELINE itself. When I go back in my
brain to the first time I ever heard
about about CYMBELINE I actually thought,
first of all, CYMBELINE was a woman.
Second of all, I when I found out it
wasn't and then I found out that he's
not really in it all that much, I was a
little like curious as to why this play
was even called CYMBELINE and then
looking at this sort of history of
female characters that he wrote and
engaging with the characters of Imogen
and then you know,
on the opposite side of that, the Queen
have these two very different stories
that are happening and I was thinking
about it this morning.
This may sound funny but this is the way
I do the job that I do but for some
reason I started thinking about the the
two Disney stories the Sleeping Beauty
and Snow White and these characters and
sort of this opposition that is
happening and seeing some of these
interesting parallels in their
relationships. So that's my weird brain
that's where I love it though
but but yeah I mean I would be really
interested just to first sort of engage
with the idea of CYMBELINE and where it
sort of sits in everything Shakespeare.
But then also the importance of these
two female characters in the story, one
of the things that went when I was asked
to be in the play, of course I hadn't, you
know I didn't know it at all and I was
told I was going to be the Queen and I
was like oh cray cray you know I played
a lot of Queens I could do that and then
and then I thought on any they said and
then Dan said oh yes and there's this
other part you're gonna be playing
Bellarius and for some reason read the
play, I was like oh yeah Bellarius, I'm
sure he like brings on a tray in the
second act. Oh my God in heaven. So anyway
so it's the it's the double and it Dakin
Matthews who lives in out here in
California, he's a big you know
Shakespearean scholar, worked with Dakin a
ton and he said oh no that's the great
pairing and started to inform me about or
talk to me, I went to see him in a play
and he started to talk to me backstage
and you know I loved playing the Queen
loved her but Bellarius stayed with me.
Oh my God as for so long -Speeches are
wonderful. I love Bellarius so much and I
love the Queen too but it was always so
fun playing the Queen who basically you
know disappears at a certain point and
then you know and then take over with
this extraordinary man who is my first
time ever playing a man and just going
back to Imogen for a second, you know I
always think of Imogen, Viola in TWELFTH
NIGHT and Rosalind in AS YOU LIKE IT as
the you know the great so what do they
call them, the trouser rolls, you know.
They're, I
think so sort of epic to me about the
fact that these parts were all first
played by young young boys and we don't
know who they were, we don't know their
names, and it was a boy playing a girl
played by you know playing a boy, and
that's so and I think that's sort of
incredible freedom that happens, Imogens.
To you two Imogens. It's you know putting
on the male clothing, what happens to you,
it gives you extraordinary freedom and
it's also of course creates barriers but
it's always been revelatory to me. I've
only ever of those three I've only ever
played Viola but I just I find the
character of Imogen so interestingly
multi-dimensional. I enjoyed watching
Lily Rabe every single night that she
played it and it was it's it's such a
fantastic role, I mean it's I think the
parts in the play are so fantastic and
if you have, you know, a way to make it a
little bit more manageable because it's
so gigantic, it's such an incredible
piece, it's an amazing play. I cannot wait
to see your production the same. I'll be
in the audience to this to the five
boroughs. I also did not know CYMBELINE
before I did Imogen many years ago. And
coincidentally before I even auditioned
for it it was, Andre Serban directed
it and um I saw the production of the
RSC that I think was a BAM. I think they
brought it to BAM, this was 1998.
I know always how long ago I did it and
what year because I was eight months
pregnant with my first son. It was just
so it's just will never leave my heart.
Anyway, so I loved the production and
loved the play and I was like, I can't
believe I've never read this or seen it.
I knew it was like going to a play
that's, this one isn't well known, but but
say you went and didn't know like a
HAMLET, didn't know how it ended you know
it was like a page-turner to me and you
know when I when I finally worked on it
and everything it became and to this day
stays my favorite Shakespeare play. I'm
gonna let us conclude there and thank
all of you for having this conversation.
I feel like we could keep
going for like another 20 30 40 minutes
maybe we need to cut a part too. Thank
you all again for coming here. Thank you
and I look forward to all of youback on the
stage, on the road and just doing the
things that we love. Yes thank you, thank
you, thank you. Everyone stay safe.
