OLD SCHOOL SHAKESPEARE
Young director Kevin Bennett keeps Shakespeare comedy true to its roots
A re- up of the Bard’s Measure for Measure by The Honest Fishmongers is done the old fashioned way, by candlelight.
Measure for Measure Saturday to Feb. 8 at 8 p. m.; 2 p. m. Saturdays and Thurs. Jan. 23| Pacific Theatre,
1440 W 12th Ave.
Tickets and info: $ 19.99 to 29.99, plus fees and charges, at pacifictheatre. org or 604- 731- 5518
Kevin Bennett is a big fan of the lowtech approach to theatre classics.
Bennett’s Vancouver theatre company, The Honest Fishmongers, is dedicated to staging the works of William Shakespeare in intimate spaces, and its production of Measure for Measure opens at Pacific Theatre this week.
Talking to the Sun during a rehearsal break, Bennett, who directs the show, said he never understood the appeal of the Bard until he was a student of the 2009/ 10 graduation class at Langara’s Studio 58 and saw the studio’s founder and former artistic director Antony Holland performing it.
“He spoke it in such a way that I understood it completely. It sounded like everyday language.”
The 25- year- old’s passion for the Bard grew with a visit to England, where he fell in love with the reconstructed Globe Theatre, Shakespeare’s original home.
“I’ve seen quite a few productions at the Globe and one of the reasons I’m so excited about it is because there’s no technology. It’s people surrounded by an audience, standing and sitting
I was never trying to form a company; I just wanted to put on great plays.
KEVIN BENNETT
DIRECTOR
communally, listening to these words and it’s a playful, eventful atmosphere. It doesn’t feel stodgy and old; it feels exciting, vibrant, new and fresh, and ever since my experiences there I’ve been kind of addicted to it.”
Inspired by the Globe, Bennett tried to draw from the “conventions or conditions Shakespeare would have worked with at the time” for Measure for Measure.
“Obviously, in Shakespeare’s time they had no electricity or lights, so when they did plays indoors — which they did often in the winter or for royalty — it would have been lit by candles. So, inspired by that, but also because Measure for Measure is all about people who are pretending to be other than they are, one of the things we’re playing with is that the actors will light themselves with candlelight.”
Bennett has also apprenticed as a director at both Bard on the Beach and Ontario’s Stratford Festival.
Veteran Vancouver actor and director Simon Webb — who’s starring in the production in dual roles of one of the leading men and one of the leading ladies — is a big fan of Bennett’s approach.
“Kevin is fearless,” says Webb. “Or, rather, he refuses to let his fear dictate what he does. He’s radical and disruptive and I’ve been waiting a lifetime for him.”
Webb is not the only local star who has bought into Bennett’s dream. The cast of 10 also includes Julie McIsaac, Emmelia Gordo and Peter Anderson.
Bennett says he reluctantly started his own company because he was pretty sure no one was going to hire a kid to direct the classics.
“So I got together with a bunch of friends that I went to school with and held auditions and we just did a production of Macbeth. Then it kind of became a company and people started to hear about it and then I decided that I wanted to do another play and I wanted to do Hamlet and then there were some equity artists and professionals that started to hear about it,” said Bennett, who directed Hamlet at the age of 21.
“I was never trying to form a company; I just wanted to put on great plays.”
Bennett’s latest production, and the company’s fourth, is arguably the least ambitious — he tackled King Lear in 2012 as well as Macbeth and Hamlet. Not that there’s anything easy about staging a twisted Shakespearean comedy about the immorality of enforced morality.
“After I did King Lear, I thought ‘ where do I go next?’, because it’s kind of the ultimate. ... So I thought it would be interesting to do one of the ones that are a little lesser known, a little more tricky in terms of how you approach it.”
Pacific Theatre’s artistic director, Ron Reed, was also intrigued by the choice.
“Pacific Theatre does plays that explore ideas of faith, and Measure for Measure’s title is from the New Testament and it explores a lot of ideas of faith. There’s a young nun who’s basically blackmailed by a Puritan. She can either save her brother’s life by sleeping with him ( the Puritan) or save her chastity. So it fits really well.”