Shakespeare the Pragmatist

I've had this conversation a few times lately with fellow theatre artists, and i think it's worth bringing out here on the blog...

One of the tragic side-effects of ceding Shakespeare to English Departments and Academia in general is the loss of a vision of Shakespeare as a pragmatic dramatist making choices to suit the needs of his company and the space they were performed in.  (This is not to say that there aren't great things to get out of english departments and academia w/r/t Shakespeare)... Yes, we all sit through a brief unit at the beginning of our Shakespeare Literature class about what the Globe was like and when it caught on fire, but rarely is an understanding of that space or the actual pragmatic needs of theatre in general part of the conversation about the text.

Shakespeare wrote for a specific company of actors working at a specific time and place and in a specific context with specific needs. And I think it's worth reckoning with those when discussing his plays.  For instance... (and it was a theater actor who brought this one up with me) The Porter Scene in Macbeth.  There's nothing like it anywhere else in the text.  It is largely a comedic monologue by a character of no real importance who never appears again and does not significantly affect the plot. Why is it there?  Well there's thematic reasons of course, and there's tension releasing reasons etc.  But isn't there also a post-murder costume change (and blood washing)  that needs to be covered? And are the knocks part of a signal from backstage to onstage that it was completed?

Also there's the random epic simile put-downs, "Well then you sir are like a man who wears no pants and poops on his own head, the poop being your reason and the pants being your lust". They were written (we think) for noblemen to write down, memorize and slay each other with at parties. 

Shakespeare wrote his plays for specific actors. Having recently directed a play written for the actors who were in it, I can testify that there is no way to do this without it fundamentally shaping the eventual script. I was at a talk that Simon McBurney gave about his Measure for Measure where he discussed researching the original production to the best of his ability, which included finding out who played various roles and how they were known in the theater community at the time.  According to him, the Duke was played by an actor known for funny voices and impressions.  This lead him to notice that the Duke speaks differently depending on who he's talking to, and the contrasts are so sharp as to render the character almost incoherent.  Now what does that say about the character, about the attitudes towards power in the play?  McBurney's production would eventually contain multimedia elements, abstract choreography and all the other trappings he's known for, but it started with originalist research.

Part of what makes Shakespeare great is that he addressed himself to the specifics of the needs of his troupe and his audience while simultaneously creating lasting art.  Sometimes I think we focus on the latter and not the former, when it's the integration of the two that makes him so special. Reading his plays as "literature" can rob us of that integration.  Of all the people who've taught me Shakespeare, the two best teachers were (a) the directing professor for whom I played Polonius in Hamlet (and thus had to have a pragmatic understanding of Shakespeare as an artist) and (b) my high school Shakespeare teacher who insisted that there was no way to understanding his plays without trying to perform the lines as you read them. 

Comments

[Duncan]

I was in a production of "As You Like It" where the director cut Touchstone's "Lie Direct" speeches. ...and later realized that then Rosalind didn't have time to change back into her girl costume.

[Ian W. Hill]

When I did "Hamlet" it became very VERY obvious to me that the entire period of Hamlet being "sent away to England" is to give the actor a much-needed (and appreciated) chance to rest. WS as active writer/manager was constantly apparent in other ways throughout (in ways such as Duncan mentions).

"Shakespeare as pragmatist" was also the basis for a very funny SCTV sketch, "Shake & Bake" where Bill is constantly rewriting "Hamlet" during the first performance backstage to deal with his actors' demands (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern demand a pay raise? Kill them off, etc.).