Paper Session 6

A gracious good morning to all. Welcome to day three of the conference, which begins with Paper Session 6, moderated by JMU's Katie Robbins.

Walter Cannon: Staging the Early Modern Fly

Flies and fly killing can rise to "the level of the archetypal" in the early modern stage. There are 36 references to flies in Shakespeare's plays, but only in Titus Andronicus is a fly made part of the central action of the scene. The scene does not appear in the quartos of Titus, leading some to dismiss the scene as a clumsy after thought, and the impact of the scene vary depending on the placement of the interval (either before or after).

Cannon jokingly points out that a trained fly would not be practical in this circumstance, but posits that sound effects may have been used. Also that there are multiple ways of killing the fly. A basic question, is it stabbed or crushed with he flat of the blade? Also, emendations of the line to "but how if that fly had a father, brother" change the address of the line that follows the killing to Marcus, and makes it less metrically awkward. This is seems to be the key of Cannon's experiment. Should the line be played for humor or for the seriousness of Titus' madness?

I'm not sure if the staging proves anything either way. This house seems to find both readings of the scene to be humorous. Maybe there's just something too pathetic about the great general reveling in his killing of a fly; perhaps the only reaction we can have is to laugh. Responses to questions seem to think the address of "father, brother" is more threatening toward Marcus, but the bear appears and cuts off questions, so just like CNN, we're going to have to leave it there.

Clare Smout: "Two of Both Kinds Makes Up Four": Casting in the Tempest

Caliban, Ferdinand, Ariel, and Miranda make up a key foursome that stand in contrast. Caiban and Ariel make up a New World or a spiritual realm, and Ferdinand and Miranda make up a European or human one. Ferdinand remains ignorant of Caliban, and Ariel has no interaction with Miranda. There is an implication of crossover between Ferdinand and Caliban with the log carrying.

Modern casting and scholarship has tended to give the role of Caliban to a more mature actor, but there is a clear implication that Caliban is roughly 24 years old, early modern casting practices seem to indicate that a young-adult male would have played the role. References to him as a "slave" and "demi-devil" are occupational, and not moral judgements, an Smout states that Prospero seems to have been grooming Caliban as a male successor on the island.

Ariel, likewise, seems to have been intended to cast the role as a boy actor, and modern productions tend to cut the references to Ariel in female clothes. An increasing tendency to have Ariel played by a scantily clad male actor creates Miranda as the only female on the island, but references to Ariel as "dainty," "delicate," and "chick" indicate Shakespeare had more feminine qualities in mind for his airy spirit.

Rather than viewing Ariel and Caliban as Propsero's Ego and Id, it might be more helpful to view them as the other half of Miranda and Ferdinand.

William (Rusty) Jones: "Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits... sets all on hazard": Performance, Context, and Generic Indeterminacy of Troilus and Cressida

Generic experimentation was apparently as hazardous in 1609 as it is today. Jones cites contemporary accounts by John Fletcher referring to audiences inability to grasp the meaning of plays, and the suggestion of the inclusion of a prologue toward the end of helping the audience understand what they are about to see. A prologue can help abate interpretive confusion; they are authorized to create meaning and bridge the gap "between the world within the playhouse walls, and those without them."

Context also determines the requirements of the prologue. A play performed at court might require a different prologue from one performed in a public space. The prologue to a potentially "dangerous" play might likewise require a more apologetic and appeasing prologue. The prologue of Troilus and Cressida poses interesting ambiguities. Its first ten lines read as a historical epic, but too much historical epic grandeur could move the prologue into a mock-epic tone. Yet a subtler approach to the prologue can ground the action of the play in a more allegorical context, which might be particularly appropriate as cassical Troy was, in early modern times, considered to be a parallel for "New Troy," or "London." Jones' actors demonstrate this difference.

Another signifying aspect, costuming, will affect the prologue as well. The prologue appears armed, which Jones suggests is in parody of Jonson's armed prologues. Jones suggests that a prologue that removes its armor might more self-consciously do so, and encourage audiences to "treat the play's world view on its own terms."

Regina Buccola: "Some Woman is the Father": Running Thomas Middleton's Gender-Bending Gamut in More Dissemblers Besides Women

Buccola examines the cross-cross dressing of boy actors in More Dissemblers Besides Women. Within the trio of cross dressed performances, the plays title (and the line from which it draws) becomes a reference to the boy actors dressed as women. Her male actors playing female parts get immediate laughs, but certainly give new meaning to lines such as "whatever thou art" and "I have love that covers all thy faults."

From where I sit, you can put a male actor in a dress, but they still look and act like a man. I'm willing to make the leap and say that, with more training, as we must assume that boy actors in the early modern era would have been, the representation would be more effective. However, the page's birthing during the dance lesson suggests that there is an element of the absurd to the construction; Buccola points out that, just as the characters should accept the character as a boy throughout the entire play until this moment, so it is also absurd that the audience should accept the character as a woman now. Perhaps seeing through the disguise is supposed to be part of the fun.

David Carnegie: Staging Rape and Marriage "per verba de praesenti" in Cardenio

Carnegie will examine the informal contracts of marriage, and the way in which rape is signaled on the early modern stage. Ferdinando's serenade in Double Falsehood is followed by his questioning of whether or not he has raped Violante. Violante enters in the following scene seemingly composed and lacking all outward stage signs of having been raped. In Don Quixote, Ferdinand promises marriage before an icon of the Virgin Mary, and despite the church's attempt to "crack down" on such informal pledges of love, they were still considered to be binding in the eyes of God.

There is a parallel between these two. In early modern terms, rape is impossible because a marriage has taken place in both cases: The woman has been wooed, and has consented to the wooing. In both cases, Violante is distressed when Ferdinando begins to try to back out of the marriage. Carnegie posits the question about what would have happened in his production if Violante had entered as if raped, but he is cut off by the bear.

Erin Baird: Taking Advantage of the Interlude Structure

Baird explores the dramatic impact of interludes on the early modern stage. She offers four case studies. Marston, introduces stage directions at the end of each act indicative of musical selections that correspond to the mood of the action surrounding the interlude. The music of the interludes becomes a direct means of forwarding his plots.

Beumont, by contrast, uses his interludes as a way of encroaching on his central plots, such as in Knight of the Burning Pestle. The interjections of the grocers defy the convention, and blur the lines of actor and audience as George, Nel, and Raffe direct the action of the play.

Jonson's use of interludes are used pragmatically to provide comments on his own work and to show the passage of time. As in The Devil is an Ass, the interlude provides commentary on the work in progress, and both recap and assess the work of the previous acts. They even go so far as trying to predict what is to come. Jonson's interludes therefore serve otherwise inattentive audience members; they keep them up to speed on what has happened, and try to engage them in the outcome of the plot.

Shakespeare jumps at the opportunity to explore the dramatic possibilities of interludes in The Tempest by having Prospero and Ariel re-enter immediately between Act 4 and Act 5. Her actors explore a more modern staging that elides the interlude into the text, and an early modern approach that includes a brief interlude between acts, which presents a more "dynamic start to the plays final act." The audience can see the passage of time, and sees the action of the final act as having been prepared for the conclusion of the play.