The ultimate warrior
Toronto actor André Sills carries epic reimagining of the Bard’s Coriolanus
Sometimes, as actor André Sills is walking down the street in Stratford, Ont., the shuttle arrives from Toronto, and he locks eyes with himself. In character as the titular Roman warrior in the Stratford Festival’s production of the epic drama Coriolanus, his image leers back at him from the side of the bus. “It feels a little strange,” the Toronto actor says and laughs.
The 6-foot-2, 245-pound former rugby player’s grand presence is just part of what makes him so convincing as a legendary warrior in the Shakespearean history. He plays the role with a constantly simmering intensity, as apparent in his choreographed combat as it is in his commanding monologues.
“Coriolanus is not an easy play,” he says. “And I am not looking for easy plays.”
In fact, Sills is playing three roles at Stratford: He also plays the villainous Sebastian in The Tempest and Brigadiere Ciappa in a new translation of the Italian comedy Napoli Milionaria. “It’s a lot,” he says.
This season is a homecoming for Sills after nine years away from the festival, during which he starred in the original Toronto Fringe Festival production of Kim’s Convenience and the Shaw Festival’s An Octoroon and “Master Harold” … and the Boys. “It is a good way to return,” he says.
He found a creative soulmate in Robert Lepage, whose credits include directing the Cirque du Soleil productions Kà and Totem. In Lepage’s conception of Coriolanus, Sills delivers his opening monologue as a projected disembodied head, addresses the Roman Forum amid cable news-style TV screens, and makes his escape from Rome while driving a vintage sports car and wearing a do-rag.
The do-rag was Sills’ idea, a nod to black culture when, it goes without saying, the character has been played by white men for much of the play’s four-century history. “People see a do-rag and think it’s a gang thing,” he says. “It is actually a practical-hair thing.”
It’s just one example of how Sills sees theatre as a way to amplify marginalized voices, introducing an audience to different ways of life. “I think we have an opportunity to educate people about who they l i ve around,” he says. “We give certain people names that dehumanize them and we purposefully forget that those people are human beings. I think in 2018 that is a pretty sad thing.
“We look at all the technology we have, how far we have come, but as a people there’s still so much work to do. A lot of theatres are taking note of that.”
Sills sees playing Coriolanus as a part of that work. “You see me as a large black man, that is what I am and I can’t change that for anybody,” he says. “But I hope that I can inform the audience of what that is like for me by playing this part.”