McCann & Mt. Greylock Prepare Plays for Fall Festival of Shakespeare ‘98

Posted by Gail M. Burns - November 1998

For the past two months students at McCann, Mt. Greylock, and eight other
western Massachusetts high schools have been hard at work preparing their
Shakespearean productions for public performance. This is the week that
McCann will offer local audiences “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” November 12 & 13
at C. T. Plunkett School in Adams; and Mt. Greylock will present “Hamlet”
November 12 & 14 in their school auditorium. Both productions will then move
on to become part of the Fall Festival of Shakespeare at Berkshire Community
College November 19-22.

This is the 10th anniversary celebration for the Fall Festival of Shakespeare,
a program of the education department of the Lenox-based Shakespeare &
Company. Director of Education Kevin Coleman remarked, “Ten Years! What an
adventure this continues to be. Nearly 100 student productions of the finest
plays ever written – over 500 students directly involved each year and another
5,000 move who have been involved behind the scenes. We’ve always said it
doesn’t get any better than this and that it doesn’t happen anywhere else.”

McCann students, who have become involved with the Fall Festival relatively
recently, are fully aware of the truth of Coleman’s statement, “This is an
exciting, phenomenal thing to have happen at McCann,” said junior Megan
Gessing of Drury, “The Sheakespeare & Company directors are awesome to work
with. They really know who you can be and who you want to be and help you
acheive those goals.”

“We don’t act as individuals, we act as a whole, ” junior Jerry McBee of Adams
explained, “The experience changes you.”

Caroline Wright, a freshman from Hancock, was able to compare her two junior
high years involved with the Fall Festival at Mt. Greylock with her McCann
experience, and agreed with McBee that theatre was more of a bonding,
community building experience at McCann. Wright was “flipping out with
excitment” tackling her first major role as Nick Bottom, “I wasn’t going to
try out at all, and I only came on the last day of try-outs,” she explained,
“I love to watch how the characters are becoming the people who play them and
the people are becoming their characters. I am not just learning how to do
something, I am learning what I already capable of doing.”

Over the mountain at Mt. Greylock, the cast is equally excited as they prepare
“Hamlet”. The students will be performing an abbreviated version of the
script which will run about 90 minutes, compared to the full three hour plus
play. Josh Bishoff, a junior from Williamstown, laughs as he runs through the
truncated version of the “To be, or not to be” soliliquy that he will present.
Bishoff is sharing the title role with junior Rebecca Bradburd, also of
Williamstown. But neither can beat the record of senior Sarah Ryan of
Lanesboro, who appears as Gertrde in this production, and who can claim this
as the fourth production of “Hamlet” in which she has appeared in her 17 years
of life.

“I played Ophelia the last time, and it is very interesting to see the
difference between her and Gertrude,” Ryan said, “Ophelia is very young and
unmarried and has no real status in the society, but Gertrude is much older
and more worldly and has a lot of clout.”

Bishoff compared his experience playing the Drag Queen in Tom Stoppard’s
“Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead” a play which focuses on those two
peripheral characters in “Hamlet”, and playing the title role in “Macbeth”.

“You bring things to the production, and you take a great deal away,”
Bradburd remarked, “I hope to convey something to the audience through my
performance.”

Sophomore Katie Haig of Williamstown is already a discriminating consumer of
the Bard, “‘Hamlet’ is not my favorite Shakespeare,” she explained, “I like
‘Macbeth’ the best. But I have discovered that I am playing the same emotions
in ‘Hamlet’ as I played last year in ‘Twelfth Night’. I love being part of
the shows. The theatre is my secondary home, and sometimes I wish it was my
first.”

“In the theatre you use all six senses,” Ryan explained, “And it is insane
how many people you touch through your performance.”

“There are no better people in the world,” Bishoff declared of his castmates.

“Hamlet” will run November 12 & 14 at Mt. Greylock Regional High School on Rt.
7 in Williamstown. Curtain is at 8 PM and tickets are $5. “A Midsummer
Night’s Dream” will run November 12 & 13 at the C.T. Plunkett School on Rt. 8
in Adams. Curtain is ar 8 PM.

McCann’ s production of “Midsummer” will open the Fall Festival of Shakespeare
at 6:30 PM on November 19 in the Robert Boland Theatre at BCC, 1305 West
Street, Pittsfield. Hamlet will be performed at 6:30 PM on November 21.
Other productions in the Festival include “King Lear” from Mt. Everett
Regional High School; “Henry V” from Lenox Memorial High; “Richard III” from
Monument Mountain; “Julius Ceasar” from Taconic; “Cymbeline” from Lee; “The
Tempest” from Springfield Central; and “Measure for Measure” from Northampton
& Smith Vocational. Tickets are $5 per show or $15 for a full Festival pass.
Call Shakespeare & Company at 413-637-1199, ext 106 for a full Festival
schedule, tickets and information.

copyright Gail M. Burns

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