WILL SMITH: “Alright Tone, get the plane”
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Miami,
Uh, South Beach, bringin the heat
MARIA XIMENA ARAGON: Miami, Florida a city known for its sunshine, beaches, and Shakespeare? Well at least for this weekend it is as the classical student production company Lovers and Madmen premiere their rendition of William Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. WNUR News caught up with the cast and crew during their dress rehearsal preparing not only for a show but the return of in person theater on campus.
GABRIELA FURTADO COUTINHO: My name is Gabriela Furtado Coutinho, I use she/her pronouns. I am a third year theatre and creative writing double major and I got the opportunity to direct Much Ado About Nothing.
ARAGON: Could you please describe the show for us?
FURTADO COUTINHO: Totally, so Much Ado About Nothing is a Shakespeare script, but in this particular rendition, it’s reimagined in Miami, Florida. And I chose this setting because I feel that it is an explosion of joy. And I think that’s really, really needed right now. It’s also a city in which people are really celebrated for the fullness of themselves. And I think that lends itself really well to healing to an audience like at Northwestern, I think that people will really have a good time.
I’m specifically setting it in post pandemic, Miami, Florida so it’s that weird transitional phase in which you know, there are the tensions of the pandemic, there are those stresses, yet people are still trying and managing to find moments of joy and reunification and community.
SHOW NOISE
Something I think is cool about this script is that every time I think Shakespeare is performed, or classical text is performed, people find ways to reclaim, and this is a script I’ve been wanting to do for a long time. It’s a script, a writer, that I’ve been one whose work I’ve been wanting to reclaim for a long time. And there’s something about the poetry of Shakespeare that I think flips people’s insides out and amplifies beautiful things about human nature, sad truths about human nature and gives a really rich textual landscape to explore and have fun. I always thought that Much Ado sounded very Miami to me, very Latin, very immigrant, very not old white men. So it was something I wanted to share.
SHOW NOISE
And it feels like a party. So that was also really my hope with this production is to make it feel like a party to make it feel like an experience and not just a theatrical event that you go to to sit down in a chair and watch and the lights go out. I wanted it to feel like you know, we’re being invited into the community and the world of Much Ado.
ARAGON: From dance numbers that invite guests to wobble or dance bachata, to beach balls thrown in the air. The show is never short of energy and excitement, and you can even see it reflected in the wardrobe. Co-costume designers Claire Scovone and Jazmine Ali-Diaz explain their inspiration.
CLAIRE SCOVONE: Very luckily, we were given a very, very fun Pinterest board of just kind of modern day Miami fashion. So we didn’t want anything to feel tacky, hopefully. But we wanted there to be colors and prints and fun. And when someone wore solid colors, we wanted it to be like a reason that they’re wearing solid colors. And when someone wore a bright pattern we wanted to be because they would wear a bright pattern. Especially just because I think that when you’re doing Shakespeare modern, the fun is that you’re always doing it of whatever year you’re doing it and trends change so fast that like you’re really kind of able to capture your lightning in a bottle with Shakespeare cuz there’s so many things you can do with it. So hopefully there’s like a little bit of 2021 fashion in there, which would be cool.
JAZMINE ALI-DIAZ: Yeah, just like taking from you know, like bright, bright fun patterns bright fun colors, like Claire said, just trying to bring that Miami Beach kind of essence into Evanston, Illinois.
SCOVONE: Shockingly few bathing suit bottoms to thrift in Evanston. Not a lot of people going to the beach in like, mid to late October
SHOW NOISE
ARAGON: Tackling the realities of a pandemic has been an ongoing challenge as the show transitioned from zoom in early June, to starting in person rehearsal in September. Double masking and weekly testing have been some of the protocols the show has adhered to. And with the university allowing actors to perform unmasked, the show must go on.
MARK BERRY: Hi, I’m Mark Berry. I use he/him and they/them pronouns. I’m a third year in the school of communications, studying theatre and the business institutions program and I’m the producer of Much Ado About Nothing.
So many feelings all at once. Mostly just like awe that it actually is happening. Most of this process for me has been Gabriela and I just kind of adding ideas on top of each other and then being like, “Okay, now which of these can actually happen?” So much of it has been able to happen in a way that I never expected that it’s going to look gorgeous and so much of my feelings are just excitement and pride that we were able to pull it off.
Things are coming together well, I think this team is genius and is working our hardest to make the best show possible but in doing so, to do it in the safest and healthiest and happiest manner we can.
ARAGON: Make sure to check out a performance this weekend on Friday, October 15th or Saturday, October 16th at Shanley pavilion
This is Maria Ximena Aragon, WNUR News.
