Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1107757
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 21 APRIL 2019 5 THIS WEEK THEATRE we got so much at The Pub, and like The Pub it brings its own character to the story we're telling. So the choice of venue and play kind of went hand in hand: if a pub was a natural place for comedy, a de- caying brothel seems like the right sort of place to explore a play steeped in sex and corruption. We definitely want to explore what the new venue has to offer: when I first de- scribed the concept to our cast, one actor described it as "Shakespeare at the Pub on drugs", and I haven't yet been able to come up with anything better. Without losing the stripped-down feel of our earlier shows, this year we have the chance to play slightly more with set and lighting and with music and dance (this year we've brought in a dedicated musician and a burlesque dancer along- side our actors). I want this to feel like the natural evo- lution to what we've been doing for the past three years. The mood at The Pub was jolly and raucous... both the chosen play and the venue promise a slightly darker turn. What can audiences expect from the show, in terms of the overall tone? Will you be retaining a casual approach, or will it be a more restrained affair? Measure for Measure is a very dark play, there's no getting round that. It's also as current as you could hope for: this is a play that hinges on a sexual assault, reading and watching it in the height of #MeToo movement, it's hard not to see the parallels in powerful men abusing their status. But it's also about the repression of our human instincts, about the conflict between our strict moral codes and our baser drives. And at the same time, it's also – in parts – very, very funny. It's clearly not a play that can or should be as laugh-a-minute as Twelfth Night or Much Ado About Nothing, but I genu- inely don't think it will feel that far re- moved. We mined the moments of dark- ness in those plays, and we're mining the comedy in this. We're not going to suddenly restrain ourselves and go all 'serious Shakespear- ean actors' because the subject matter is more serious. All the elements that made The Pub feel casual and accessible – the intimacy, the audience involvement, the pace and energy – are still going to be there, but we're applying them to differ- ent material. Though you're wisely drip-feeding information on the play at the time of writing, the cast appears to be made up of both WhatsTheirNames regulars, with some newcomers thrown in. What was your process when choosing the 'new players', and what do you hope each of them will bring to the show? With a cast of six playing multiple roles, it's always been really important to us to find actors who understand the nature of what we're doing and who can form a good team over what's usually a quite chaotic rehearsal period. So this year, apart from our mainstays Joseph Zammit and Nathan Brimmer, we're really excited to be bringing in Joe Azzopardi, who appeared in our first two shows and is now fresh off his feature film success in The Boat, and two hugely exciting young actresses in Sandie Von Brockdorff and Michela Farrugia. And in the monumental part of Duke Vincentio we have Jonathan Dunn, who in a couple of years has es- tablished himself as one of the best per- formers on the scene. We're also quite chuffed to be fea- turing burlesque dancer Undine La Verve, because Shakespeare in Malta has been woefully lacking in burlesque so far, and our pianist Marie-Elena Farrugia. All the performers have brought an energy and inventiveness to the process that I'm really looking forward to sharing with audiences. Measure for Measure: Strait Street Shakespeare will be staged at The Splendid, Strait Street, Valletta on April 25, 26, 27 and 28, and May 2, 3, 4 and 5 at 8pm. Bookings: whatstheirnames. theatre@gmail.com, 7734 5207 or 7905 2522 "If a pub was a natural place for comedy, a decaying brothel seems like the right sort of place to explore a play steeped in sex and corruption" "What we discovered was that there was an appetite for unpretentious, stripped-down Shakespeare that focuses above all on engaging the audience and having fun together" The Measure for Measure cast, from left: Joe Azzopardi, Jonathan Dunn, Nathan Brimmer, Sandie von Brockdorff, Michela Farrugia and Joseph Zammit Joseph Zammit Michela Farrugia Joseph Zammit and Sandie von Brockdorff