Tempest Living Archive

As part of this project they have been running a series of workshops with a crack team of students from the BA Honours Uni course at Winchester and two Chesil Theatre members (Alice Chadwick and Jonathan Edgington) have been taking part in the workshops.  P4 have asked Jonathan for his thoughts on progress to date:

“I was totally captivated by P4’s magical production of “Shiver” at The Chesil in 2006 and when I heard that they were looking for volunteers to assist with the research and development of The Tempest, I jumped at the opportunity to join their team.  With four workshops in the offing, I had visions of long cosy chats about visual and musical interpretations of the text, culminating with a nice entry on my writers’ CV about my association with a professional theatre company.  How wrong was I - little did I realise that I was about to be well and truly catapulted out of my comfort zone! 

Having re-read the text and watched clips of Jarman’s film version of The Tempest  and Greenaway’s Prospero’s Books  on You Tube,  I turned up for the first workshop, in the sumptuous rehearsal rooms at Winchester University, feeling reasonably confident.  My confidence took a knock early on when I realised that I was the oldest workshop member (by more years than I cared to calculate) and that the other members, apart from being young, were all extremely talented.  

After an introductory discussion, we were allocated characters in the play and asked to narrate his/her relationship to another character - anyone who hadn’t read the play (and retained an intimate knowledge of it) would have struggled with this exercise!  I was Prospero and narrated his relationship to Miranda.  I got through this OK, although the video camera recording the exercise didn’t help.  I made a mental note to brush up on my improvised acting skills!  We finished off with some mirroring exercises - pairs talking to each other and subtly trying to copy each other’s mannerisms (as characters alone on an island for several years would no doubt do).

The second workshop called further upon our improvised acting skills with its theme of theatrical transformation, as we explored the gradual process of actor transforming to character and then back from character to actor.  At the end of this exercise we were required to individually walk to the front of the stage, address the audience by saying “this is my Caliban” (or “this is my Miranda”) and then to transform into the character (again on camera).

Sadly, I missed the third (music) workshop, due to the dreaded ‘flu.  I’m told that cello, flute, mandolin, clarinet, recorder and guitar played by Alice, the students and some of the P4 team were used to transpose the music at the back of the Arden edition of the play and to create a very effective soundscape. 

The fourth (and most recent) workshop was (to me) the most awesome involving more improvised acting and text reading skills alongside not only professional P4 actors but two members of the RSC!!.  I won’t easily forget skipping around the rehearsal room beating out the iambic pentameter on the back on an RSC actor, turning in the opposite direction on the fifth beat! 

I’ve had a great time so far and the nice thing is that P4 tell me that I have made a useful contribution (though sometimes not always in the way I intended) to proceedings.  I’m looking forward to seeing the “work in progress” at the Chesil in October and to seeing the play when it goes on tour next year”.

When we workshopped ‘performers being themselves’ in the space and this merging into parallels with the story, I found these natural links very fascinating. also the RSC workshop was very cool. We broke down a verse so much that it seemed strange to think I was having so much trouble with it when I first read it.

I didn’t really know this play and I haven’t even read it all the way through when we first met. We soon  got stuck in discussing and exploring the text so I soon felt as if I did know it and began to enjoy it.

I saw it once at the theatre royal but only rememebered I had because I found the ticket! So it obviously didn’t strike a chord with me.

While working on it though I have gained a better understanding of shakespeare’s text in general and really seen the beauty in some lines that when we first read them meant nothing. It’s been a great process and I feel I’ve gained a great deal.

I’d never realised the importance of the sea and its ultimate part in the events of the play. It’s as if all the characters ’suffer a sea-change into something rich and strange’. But does Prospero really control the sea or is the sea in control of him?

I was intrigued by the matching of Caliban with Ferdinand and a wonderful moment came when Andy changed from one to the other almost seamlessly. Perhaps this tells us something about ‘appearances’. Perhaps Miranda’s childish mind is seeing more of a contrast than is really there.

Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes;
Nothing of him that does fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.

Discovering T S Eliot’s The Wasteland opened my eyes to The Tempest - “those are pearls that were his eyes” - the sea change wrought by great art on my life continues to resonate.  Pollock’s Full Fathom Five should be the backdrop to the new production!

Odd choice, title-wise. The tempest itself is over and done with in a handful of lines - why call the whole play that? Imagine going to see Macbeth - and he got killed at the end of scene one. Or all’s well that ends well - and everything ended well after the first minute. Why not call it the island or Prospero’s tragedy? Maybe the players had a particularly full-on thunder-making device and they wanted to market the play accordingly. That’s my theory. Gustav �

At the age of twelve and possessed of a good treble voice, I was one of many dragooned into performing an arrangement of ‘Full fathom five etc.’ for tenor solo and chorus for the school summer concert. Not entirely surprisingly, and far from exclusively, I loathed it. My only acquaintance with Shakespeare at that point was a fairly abortive effort with A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which I similarly found irrelevant and slightly embarrassing; yes I know Shakespeare used boy actors for girl parts, but it was still slightly uncomfortable in an exclusively male pre-pubescent environment and a man with a donkey’s head? Please!!!? I confess I still have trouble with the play.
Six years later, deep into A level, how my attitude had changed; I hope that’s education working. “This thing of darkness I acknowledge mine.”  The line leaps into my head whenever the play is even mentioned. His vengeful machinations brought to fruition, the pitiful attempt at usurpation foiled, Prospero must face his responsibility for Caliban. Caliban has acted according to his nature (and badly at that!) but Prospero has arguably perverted the creature further by his enslaving and continuous punishments laced with a cold arrogance. Decisions and actions have consequences. Repression breeds violence.

KLM

I saw the Cheek by Jowl Tempest in the 80’s in which Stephano & Trinculo were played as a music hall double act - There was a very funny but also quite moving scene where they tried to teach Caliban a song and dance routine!

Sean Aita

For me, The Tempest is all about Gielgud doing the cloud-capped towers speech in Greenaway’s film, Prospero’s Books. It’s like the twentieth-century’s most elegant Shakespearean acting saying goodbye in a way akin to Shakespeare’s goodbye through the play. But then, also for me, The Tempest is all about Aime Cesaire’s radical post-colonial re-writing un Tempete, which has wonderful dialogues between Caliban - the revolutionary - and Ariel - who bides his time as a servant hoping for freedom. Of course, the second scene is interminable and the wedding masque is boring as hell and Prospero is a tyrant, but apart from that it’s ok… I guess the fact that it so effortlessly embraces both the aesthetic and the political goes some way to explaining its greatness…Â

I saw The Tempest last year back in Guernsey I really enjoyed it.  The best part of the performance was one of the characters dressed in a bright blue dress being chased on a unicycle.Â