I have just handed over the reins of my current project, Take Their Life, to the stage manager, Joyce Gore. I thought I was scared of directing anything of Shakespeare's before, but now I'm even more scared because I no longer have any control over what happens!
I have learned an awful lot from the experience of directing a sacred cow. Having only directed new, or relatively new, works before, I've never had to deal with strongly-established and conflicting interpretations of character before. The principles are the same: you look for various interpretations and pick the one that best suits your needs, but when there is such a wide range of varying interpretations, and when some of those interpretations are so firmly entrenched from centuries of analysis, it can be a tough call to pick the one that best suits our purposes.
All directors say it, but it really has been a pleasure to work with such a talented cast. They've amazed me at times with their capacity to take an idea I've had about how a character should act or respond, and incorporate that into a holistic expression of a character, which essentially is nothing more than a concept. I have found it quite humbling to watch those characters emerge from vague and shadowy ideas in my head into characters who stand and walk about and interact as if they're real people.
So next stop is opening night, when we turn Shakespeare's sacred cow into a profane one. I hope people enjoy it, but really, the best part of the experience of profaning a sacred cow is over, and after nine months in development, I am both breathing a sigh of relief, and beginning to fret about letting it go.
Chookas, cast.
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