HUMN 303N Week 4 Assignment: Essay – Play Analysis – William Shakespeare Play – Graded An A+

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William Shakespeare is known for many things some good and bad, but mostly for his artistic view on the world displayed in poems and plays. One of his more known plays is The Tempest, written in appro... ximately 1610. Rumor has it that this was one of his last plays he masterfully wrote. Many works of Shakespeare are dark and show a side a lot of people do not delve into, but he managed to capture every feeling humanly possible and even provide the audience with comedic relief. Shakespeare’s works have been taught, studied and recreated for centuries as it is a part of American culture forever. In June of 2014 the Savage Rose Classical Theatre Company performed their rendition of The Tempest and recorded it for all to see. The staging could be described as simple with no exaggeration to it. There were two staircases used for actors to enter and exit the stage between their scenes. In the play the main character, Prospero, does a lot on his own and there was a section on the stage for him to stand or sit when needed without disturbance of moving sets around. To provide the audience with the mysterious ambience Shakespeare liked to have in his played they made the lighting dim almost completely dark. In addition to the ambience the lighting provided it was also to keep the audiences’ attention on center stage. As the play goes on to show the different characters as they appeared, they used soft spotlights. The costumes were meek as that was suiting for the time era in which this play was meant for. Though meek no costume looked the same as it helped aid in the visualization of each character as their own. The tones at the beginning felt vengeful and progressed into remorseful and forgiving. Many could interpret the mood swings and tone changes in the play as neoclassical. Neoclassical is a style termed for Western movements in decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music and architecture that feeds on the inspiration of classical art and culture (Neoclassical, 2019). This is style is displayed as two main characters start to love one another. As in most of Shakespeare’s plays the tone starts as quiet or almost whispered thoughts in a serious manner with moments of dark humor. From there the tone and mood is elevated and joyful as problems are resolved and actions are forgiven. To read the play with no actors and the use of your own imagination it can be hard to understand as Shakespeare had an interesting dialogue in most of his plays as that was how English was at the time it was written. However, the producing theatre simplified the terminology and language used for the audience to follow along with. As for the performance as a whole I was impressed and delighted to watch it. I used to be in a Shakespeare group myself in high school and this was not one of the plays we performed so it was interesting to see more of Shakespeare’s work as mentioned prior it is sometimes hard to understand the dialogue due to the language used. The actors and directors were very talented in their rendition of The Tempest. An outdoor playhouse called the Globe was many plays including majority of Shakespeare’s plays were performed. In the written play, Prospero bellows, “The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve” (IV.i.152-154). At the time the audience is likely to believe he is speaking of the Globe theatre itself, however, when Shakespeare finished The Tempest it could have been performed indoors at the Blackfriars Hall unlike all the other plays that had been performed. According to history to achieve the desired sound effects at the time the play was written they used fireworks, thunder-sheets and in some cases if they needed something more boisterous they used a cannonball rolled down a set of stairs to create the sound of thunder. To entertain the contemporary style of this era new or additional characters were added to the plays. (Stage History: The Tempest, 2019). In the 17th century it was common for only men to act in the plays which included female characters such as Ariel. It was not until the 19th century and in the early 1930’s that this role was identified as female. As we reached the 19th century, Caliban was at this time recognized as a mystical human type creature attempting to free himself from the animal instincts he possessed. As time goes on our production of plays has drastically improved with technology, costumes, props and sounds. This allows us to assimilate the desired effects the original writers, in this case Shakespeare, wanted to come from their plays. As mentioned earlier, sounds of thunder had to be manually created for each performance with thunder boards or cannonballs, but today we have recordings of the sound that can be played with the touch of one key. In addition to sound effects, lighting no longer has to be planned for the right time of day for light to hit the stage as lights are largely produced today and with different hues to create further effect on the plays. Adaptations of these plays continue to tell the original story, but most are changed to be more relatable to current times and for the purpose of understanding the meaning behind the play. Which each adaptation the focus seems to shift and characters change sometimes for the good and others not so much. For example, throughout the 19th century, the tree rearranges at the ending so that Caliban end the play properly (The Tempest Synopsis, 2019). In addition to simplifying dialogue for understanding it is also done as many dialogues are dragged out of proportion with useless words and many plays if played out word for word and scene for scene would be two or three times the length it is today. In the end the same story is told and the plays purpose continues to inspire others even if the dialogue and characters are no longer the same. References Neoclassical. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.dictionary.com/browse/neoclassical Savage Rose Classical Theatre Company (July 10, 2014). The Tempest- Full Play. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czFoUWwd6mI Shakespeare, W. (n.d). Stage History: The Tempest. Retrieved from http://www.rsc.org.uk/the- tempest/about-the-play/stage-history Shakespeare, W. (n.d.). The Tempest. Retrieved from http://shakespeare.mit.edu/tempest/full.html Shakespeare, W. (n.d.). The Tempest Synopsis. Retrieved from http://www.playshakespeare.com/the-tempest/synopsis [Show More]

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