Premiere US Premiere
Production Language English
Country of Origin England, United Kingdom
Description One year after its acclaimed debut at BAM with A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Propeller returned with The Winter’s Tale, this time as part of the Next Wave Festival. Since each production is cast using all the members of the standing ensemble (all are paid the same wage and no one gets fired), successive visits showcase range. The actor who was lauded as an impish Puck in Midsummer returned in this production as a regal queen, albeit one with male-pattern baldness. And within productions, actors are cast in multiple roles; the King doubles as a lowly, ensemble sheep; ill-fated Mamillius reappears as his sister. Propeller, an all-male Shakespeare troupe, makes no attempt to hide male characteristics or disguise them with wigs or falsetto. Actors focus on the emotional development of the character, and audiences make the shift. When this production’s King Leontes spit at Scardifield’s Queen Hermione, audiences gasped, caught up in the drama.
Also characteristic of Propeller productions is music and onstage soundscape that’s developed and played by the actors. In this production, company members played bongos, flute, trombone, piano, guitar, and sang lusty drinking songs set to Shakespeare’s text. The 16-year jump after intermission was ushered in by an actor playing a jazz riff on piano.
As son of Royal Shakespeare Company founder Sir Peter Hall, Propeller Artistic Director Edward Hall comes by his Shakespeare naturally. Hall had also been involved in a previous production of The Winter’s Tale at BAM, RSC’s 1994 production in which he was credited in the program as Assistant Director.
And a bit of fun: this play contains Shakespeare’s most famous stage direction, “Exit, pursued by a bear.” The Propeller production solved the problem of the off-stage mauling by having a young Mamillius act it out with his teddy bear.
Identifier 2005f.00829
