Long live the Bard! 🎭

This weekend was our third year competing at the Utah Shakespeare Festival/Southern Utah University High School Competition. The competition weekend is so exciting - 3400 youth descended on the campus of Southern Utah University. They traveled from Utah, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, California, Wisconsin, the Virgin Islands (I think I heard all of these mentioned, not sure if there are even more…) The atmosphere is electric. As you move through campus, there are teens walking everywhere in costumes ranging from traditional Renaissance to fascinating modern creations. Shakespeare scenes are being rehearsed on the grass. I love to walk by and try to recognize which play and scene they are rehearsing. It is an inspiring atmosphere. But it is also a game.

The first year we came not knowing what to expect and were caught like startled deer in the headlights. Our scores were all in the lower fourth of our division. And let me tell you about our division! Wow! Intimidating. In general, the divisions are according to the size of your school. The largest high schools compete against each other, the next largest against each other and so it goes according to size, or age - middles schools in the same division, charter schools in the same division. But we are a small non-profit and our team is a Shakespeare program for homeschoolers. There are other homeschool groups in our division, but we are also grouped with other teams who don’t fall into a traditional school category: the small professional conservatories - in particular the University of Utah Youth Conservatory, and a group from Wisconsin called First Stage: Young Company. They are impressive. They are the big guns. They command attention and they are fantastic! But it is quite intimidating to go up against them. From what I can tell from my online stalking they have far greater resources of time, money and talent; they have their own dedicated rehearsal spaces, they demand a lot more rehearsal time, and they are either audition only and/or very high monthly tuition which is a kind of weeding out process in and of itself. Those young actors are very dedicated, talented and most likely on a professional track. There is a third group that I don’t know too much about, Logan Youth Shakespeare, but they have been exceptional every time I’ve seen them. And again, from my thorough online stalking process, it looks like U of U, First Stage, and Logan Youth basically take turns winning our Essex division each year, and just play musical chairs as they rotate through 1st, 2nd and 3rd places.

Our second year, we knew a little better what to expect. Each school brings a basic comp team of 3 monologues, 2 duo/trio scenes, and one ensemble piece with 4+ actors. I knew that the first year, of course, but one thing I learned from our first year was that the judges were NOT looking for what they termed, “a museum piece.” They wanted to see your fresh, new interpretation of Shakespeare. So, our second year for our ensemble piece we prepared a compilation titled “All the World’s a Stage.” We costumed each character as an archetypal high school student: the jock, the student body president, the emo/goth, the pretty popular girl, the smart girl, the bullies and the victim. We pieced together scenes and monologues to try to show that Shakespeare’s words were still timely and applicable to these youth. One of the things I loved most about this scene was that my own teenage daughters helped me to conceptualize and compile it. The ideas and the visuals were powerful. But our little acting troupe had a mix of very powerful actors and some who were just getting their feet wet. So, even though our concept was strong, our execution was sometimes shaky. But I loved every minute of working with these kids and helping them to understand the text and create their characters. We put in some fun text about unrequited love, of course - what high school student doesn’t relate to that? We touched on bullying. And we had one particularly powerful moment on stage when the Student Body President character has just rallied everyone for the big football game - using a battle speech from Henry V and having a little fun with a poster for the imaginary St. George “Tigers,” playing on the name of the neighboring city and the text of the monologue. At the end of the speech they are all circled together on stage left and give a big cheer. The audience usually laughed and then we put them in hard freeze, while isolated, on the opposite side of the stage, our emo/goth character took off her headphones and began the Hamlet “To be or not to be” monologue. It was a chills up your back moment. I was incredibly proud when we took fourth place for this ensemble piece, right after First Stage, Logan Youth, and University of Utah. For us, fourth place was a WIN!!! And the First Stage coach even came up to us after to compliment our piece. It was a powerful and bonding scene for us as a team and it also gave us a great boost of confidence. We also moved up in the overall Sweepstakes rankings to 7th place.

So, let’s get to this weekend. Actually, let’s back up just a pinch first… As a coach, I am always trying to improve my own skills. I attended a Directing Shakespeare Camp this summer hosted by the Utah Shakespeare Festival. Jan and Andy Hunsaker (or “Jandy” as we lovingly called them) were phenomenal and very encouraging to all of the teachers who attended. We also got to do workshops with actors from the festival. Anyway, I learned a lot of skills that I took back to our rehearsals this year.

We took a team again of three monologues, two duo/trio scenes, our ensemble scene AND we ventured into the music competition this year with a Minstrel category piece. I am very proud of our team and the hard work that they put into their pieces this year. Our ensemble scene was King Lear, Act 1, Scene 1. But I added a little intro and a tableau to end the piece. I also added two characters that I called the Fates. They were other-worldly, beautiful representations of the voices we hear in our heads. They flowed across the stage with billowing skirts and long hair. They whispered into the ears of certain characters at crucial junctions. After all, the very essence of a tragedy is that one pivotal moment, that one decision that inevitably leads to the destructive consequences. I wanted the Fates to represent the mad voices that King Lear must have heard in his head, but also the tempting influences of power, money, lust. We costumed the characters to reflect their mental states - Lear and the fates were red and black, reflecting Lear’s descent to madness. Goneril, Regan, their husbands and Burgundy were gray to show they were under the influence of the Fates evil purposes. But Cordelia, Kent and the King of France were dressed in white and did not entertain the Fates whisperings. As we rehearsed, we talked about the extremes represented in King Lear, but also likened the “voices in our heads” to the feelings that we all have sometimes - that we aren’t good enough, or to the temptations to do things we know will hurt us in the end. We have a choice to listen to those voices or not. We can make positive choices no matter what the voices in our heads or the world around us tells us. I always want my team to be able to take away life lessons from the beauty of Shakespeare’s words and themes. Lear makes a bad choice, and then doubles down on it. Perhaps we can learn to be more humble and to trust those around us who really care for us.

Our competition slot was Saturday morning about 11am. We rehearsed, warmed up, and prayed before and I think everyone felt as ready as they could - despite nerves and excitement. And the wind! Which actually, made our Fates skirts and hair billow out with a great dramatic flair! Nice touch, Mother Nature. Our actors felt good about their performance. We could hear them - which is always a challenge in the outside Adams Theater. And I was so proud of them. The feedback from the judges was very positive and rewarding. I was so happy that they liked my edits and artistic choices. They praised our ensemble for being very engaged even when they didn’t have lines. They could tell that they were listening and reacting. They praised our actors for their honesty. They liked our blocking and color choices. We were all relieved and deeply satisfied with a job well done.

But of course, it wasn’t over yet…The award ceremony was Saturday night. We gathered in the auditorium theater. Fred Adams, the founder of the Utah Shakespeare Festival announced the winners. Third, Second, and First prizes were awarded in monologues and duo/trio categories and guess who filled those rankings - First Stage, U of U, and Logan Youth. And they deserved it, of course! Their teams are strong!

Then it was time to announce the ensemble winners. My goal this year was to just hold onto a solid fourth place after these amazing companies. For me, like last year’s fourth place, that would have been a win. My dream, my stretch goal, was to knock any of them out of the top three and take third place. That would have been amazing! So, Fred Adams announced third place: First Stage! Then second place: University of Utah! Now, at this point, my team tells me that they all gave up hope. They were sure Logan had won. But I, on the other hand, had seen Logan’s ensemble piece and even though it was fantastic, in my heart, I really felt like we had done better this year and I suddenly felt a very real possibility that the next name Fred called could be ours. My heart started pounding out of my chest. I couldn't wait to just get the next few moments over with and find out the results! But, Fred chose that moment to pause and say something like, “I just want to take a moment and comment on the tremendous growth that has taken place over the past few years in this division. It is truly incredible to see how this group has grown.” Etc, etc…. To my thumping heart, it seemed like he was talking forever, but I’m sure it was just a few extra seconds in reality. And then suddenly, he was announcing “First Place Ensemble, Essex Division: Sweet Harmony!” And the rest was crazy, loud screams of joy and all of us jumping up and hugging and screaming some more! It was thrilling! It was exhilarating! It was a Disney movie moment of the rag tag team that no one expected to win, coming from behind and taking the trophy! I know this is all a game - a very subjective and artistic game. And who knows what will happen next year. But, for now, we have arrived. We WON!!!!! And I will just relish that fun fact and know that we can compete with the big boys.


In fact, the U of U coach asked me in passing, “Which scene did you do? I didn’t get to see all of them.” And I thought - you didn’t see us this year, but you’ll be watching NEXT year! Nothing wrong with a little friendly competition, right? And truly, these teams are all so talented and innovative. It is a privilege to be in the same division and have them push us to push ourselves.

We also moved up in our overall rankings to fourth place Sweepstakes. I’m just so proud of our amazing team and I love getting a chance to coach them and stretch my creative muscles in a genre I am passionate about. All in all, a deeply satisfying and memorable weekend! Long live the Bard!
Ps You can watch our scene here: King Lear 1:1