This post is hard for me to write. Mostly because it’s hard to describe the experience with words. For those of you know the kind of experience I had with my senior theatre project at Cedarville then you understand exactly the kind of emotions, awe, and wonder that this production evoked. It truly was a midsummer night’s dream. NOT intentionally PUNNY! (The hot season in the Phils or summer is from from March to May. Our play was April 24-26. :o) The great thing about Shakespeare is that it a blank canvas, you can do whatever you want with it. But I’ve come to realize that the blank canvas can also be TOTALLY overwhelming when you aren’t an abstract thinker. Thankfully, I had willing people around me who stepped up to help brainstorm, design, choreograph, buy fabric, paint, sew, and tell me the ideas I did have weren’t crazy (even when they were). I felt like the luckiest director in the world as I sat in the audience and watched our creation come to life.
Beyond the frustrating challenge of selecting a play that would fit my goals, it being my first big show at Faith this play came along with additional challenges that I wasn’t sure how I was going to handle initially. Faith Academy is blessed with an incredible facility that rivals most college facilities smack in the middle of a country where fabric is next to free, set materials are inexpensive, and employing people to help is always possible. On top of that the fine arts staff is world class (they might not believe that about themselves, but it’s true) so there is a level of expectation that the April production at Faith will be something spectacular. Last year’s production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast was off the charts incredible and it left me big shoes to fill. The trouble with trying to fill shoes is that no two years are alike– staff changes, students graduate, band directors leave 🙁 and people furlough. So instead of trying to live up to an impossible expectation I decided to not only do my best to fill my original two goals but to add one–do something completely different. I wanted to make a mango to put up next to the pineapples and bananas. All fruit equally delish, totally incomparable. I could be way off, ask someone who’s not totally biased, but I think we achieved said goal.
Graphics by Miss Miriam Choi
An incredible hair an makeup team headed up by Miss Miriam Choi and Mrs. Amy Black!
Costumes by Mrs. Wendy Ballentyne and Ate Mayet.
Set and Lights and a bunch of other stuff thanks to Mr. Dan Eyestone, Kuya Tony and company.
An AMAZING production team.
Theseus (blue cuffs) tells Hermia (in brown) must marry Demetrius (in brown) or be banished/die according to the law.
But she loves Lysander who propses they run away and get married. Helena is the one who actually loves Demetrius.
The fairies and sprites gather in the woods outside Athens. (Choreography by Miss Nicole Amper.)
King Oberon is mad at Queen Titania because she won’t give him the Indian boy to be his servant. Oberon tells Puck to use the magic flower on Demetrius while he’s sleeping so that when he wakes and sees her he will love Helena while he uses it to trick Titania into giving him the boy.
Titania’s fairies sing and dance her a lullaby.
Oberon potions Titania but Puck potions Lysander instead of Demetrius! Oopsie!
Meanwhile, some common workers rehearse a play they intend to perform for Theseus’ wedding and Puck turns one of them into a Donkey.
The donkey is noisy and wakes Titania who immediately falls in love with it!
Now Hermia doesn’t know why Lysander left her but she assumes Demetrius had something to do with it and Oberon is mad at Puck for messing up!
So Oberon puts the potion on Demetrius while he’s sleeping but now they are BOTH in love with Helena (who is super confused and thinks they’re playing a joke on her).
When Hermia finds them and Lysander confesses his love for Helena, Helena blames Hermia for putting him up to the joke.
But Hermia thinks that Helena has come in the night and stolen Lysanders heart (well, and she’s mad because everyone keeps calling her little).
Puck tricks the angry men looking to duel and fixes it so they’ll love the right people when they wake.
Meanwhile, the fairies care for Bottom as Titania is still in love with him.
Oberon starts to feel bad (and has already talked Titania into giving him the child) so he wakes her from the spell and they dance together to keep the Athenian couples sleeping.
As morning dawns Theseus and Hippolyta come into the woods on a hunting expedition. He wakes the lovers to find out that Demetrius now loves Helena so there is no reason to force Hermia to make a decision any longer. He overrides her fathers wishes and invites the happy couples to have a joint wedding with him.
Bottom wakes from his crazy donkey dream to race off and find the other actors. Theseus chooses the awful common workers play as entertainment despite the Philostrates objections.
Lovers Pyramus and Thisbe speak through a hole in the wall and swear to meet under the moonlight at Ninus’ tomb.
But the lion scares off Thisbe and chews on her cloak so that when Pyramus returns he thinks Thisbe is dead and nobly kills himself for love. When Thisbe returns she screams, “FRIENDS, CRY WITH MEEEE!” and then also kills herself. The end. (It’s a really REALLY bad play.)
They dance (Alpha Delta Butterfly). Everyone gets involved, but Egeus, Hermia’s father, is not happy about it.
“Hey I just met you and this is crazy but here’s my number so call me maybe…”
“Baby, you light up my world like nobody else! The way that you flip your hair get’s me overwhelmed but when you smile at the ground it ain’t hard to tell you don’t know you’re beautiful!”
“That’s what makes you beautiful!”
Tthe fairies bless the couples with long life and many children by dancing through the palace.
“Give us your hands if we be friends and Robin shall restore amends.” -Puck
