mShakespeare’s Twelfth Night, Act 2 – Open-Ended Run
Ina Centaur
March 9, 2010
Contact: Lora Constantine (lora at mshakespeare dot com)
Metaverse Shakespeare Company’s 2010 Main Canon: Twelfth Night, Act 2
– Open-Ended Run
Shakespeare, Second Life—The Metaverse Shakespeare Company (MSC),
formerly SL Shakespeare Company (SLSC), next Tuesday will open its
long-awaited 2010 Main Canon production of Twelfth Night, Act 2—“As
you will it!” in an open-ended run to occur every Tuesday at 6 PM SLT
(PDT), and every Sunday at 1 PM SLT (PDT). Set to occur at the 4-sim
SL Globe Theatre (http://visit.mshakespeare.com) in the virtual world
of Second Life—this live theatrical performance, available anywhere
with an Internet connection, continues the troupe’s 2009 production of
Twelfth Night, Act 1—but, with a fresher, riper take, and its own
amalgam of the year’s innovations in virtual theatre.
Artistic Director Ina Centaur has crafted an interpretation that
conveys the topsy-turvy nature of the play and the era of its
creation, without being bound by the constraints of a
historically-accurate production, “Even though this production is set
in a pre-modernity ‘generic past,’ there’s still plenty of Elizabethan
bawdry and notions… There’s the presentation of class-crossing as a
ridicule-prone absurdity, both directly, through a miasma of brooding,
obsessive maliciousness as Maria and Co. plan their ‘practical joke’,
and indirectly like when Sir Aguecheek… that ducat-flowing knave
knight… impersonates a dog playing catch in Scene 3, with paupers
Feste and Toby as his masters… And, then there’s some intense visual
portrayal of that heavily-cozy-explicit language—with a wild bit where
a drunk-betimes Sir Toby Belch urinates live on-stage to “[fill] an
unfill’d can (II.iii).” Says Centaur on the music of Twelfth Night and
the spirit of the open-ended run, “We’re providing sheet music and
instrumental-only clips for all of our songs on the mShakespeare Blog,
so that audience members can sing along with our live show (with their
SL mic’s off, in the privacy of their own home) or in their own
Metaverse Shakespeare theatre-inspired karaoke events... For most
shows, we’re sticking with an orthodox interpretation and traditional
songs, drawn from eras before and Shakespeare’s contemporaries. But,
this being an open-ended run, be braced for variations, and character
metamorphosis—in both act and appearance.”
This Open-Ended run of Twelfth Night, Act 2—“As you will it!”, like
Act 1, will evolve into a final form, per audience interaction on the
play’s progression. These interpretations are based on archetypes,
grounded in the play’s intrinsic elements, such as character
relationships. In April, the troupe will begin weaving “Variations” to
its main interpretation, where certain characters will undergo some
dramatic metamorphoses. Antonio and Sebastian will oscillate between
varying degrees of a close-friendship, from the orthodox
interpretation of caring-companionship to, in the words of Artistic
Director Ina Centaur, “a homo-erotic or quasi-masochistic relationship
to finally settle down and arrive at the one that fits best!” Most
curiously, Malvolio, that time-weathered face, will de-age, becoming,
as described by an anonymous patron, “a complexion that e’en you may
fancy”, in the virtual world’s take on new scholarship interpretations
of Shakespeare’s tragic villain-victim as a young man. For select
shows, gender-experimentation interpretations will manifest in
all-female or all-male or even switched-gender productions of the
play. The troupe will once again show its April Fools “Super Spoof”
edition in a special performance on Thursday, April 1, that will
explore the character relations of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night via a
medley of parodies inspired by popular modern shows.
While this will be the troupe’s first production under its new name of
Metaverse Shakespeare Company, Centaur asserts that the production
continues to uphold the company’s founding ideals of creating quality,
memorable productions, while developing this nascent field of virtual
theatre, “As with every Main Canon production, we spend about a
thousand hours rehearsing and analyzing, building and designing, and
also applying new technologies to virtual theatre… For Twelfth Night,
Act 2, our three technological innovations include the usage of
physics, moving automatons, and visual illusion on the virtual stage.
You’ll see physics on-stage, in both built-in and scripted forms in
our apple catches in Scene 3, and wilting rose motif in Scene 4—and,
in the crawlspace of Scene 3, you’d see prim-based automaton actors in
the form of rats!”
Special to this production, the MSC introduces the concept of
“crowdsourced interactive set design,” which allows anyone to submit a
graffiti message or poster/flyer idea to be plastered onto the “City
Wall of Illyria” set in Act 2, Scene 1. More details at
http://bit.ly/illyriangraffiti
The live show, presented via SL Voice, is also available in
closed-captioning with live subtitles in English, Esperanto, French,
German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, and Spanish.
Starting March 16, shows occur
Tuesdays at 6 PM SLT (PDT)
Sundays at 1 PM SLT (PDT)
only at the SL Globe Theatre at Shakespeare (255,255,25), Second Life
All shows are free (“pay as you will”), except for VIP performances,
occurring on the last Tuesday and Sunday of each performance month.
About Twelfth Night, Act 2
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night is a multiplot story with plentiful songs
and bawdry topsy-turviness. On one hand it’s the story of a
shipwrecked girl named Viola, whose choice to go incognito as a boy
eunuch results in myriad complications—including a gender-bending love
triangle. On another, it chronicles the fallacious rise and tragic
fall of a Puritanical steward named Malvolio, who becomes a victim of
his too-lofty dream. Act 2 sets the basics for his downfall—his
dysfunctional relationship with the other servants provokes a
practical joke involving a certain forged letter, that would
eventually ruin him—but, Act 2 sparks only of joviality; tragedy is
due in a later act.
About the Metaverse Shakespeare Company (mShakespeare)
Headquartered in the virtual world of Second Life (SL), the Metaverse
Shakespeare Company (MSC) is the flagship project of sLiterary’s
Virtual Reality Shakespeare Initiative (VRSI). MSC is a professional
virtual theatre company that embraces the best of what the metaverse
has to offer. While it is primarily known to provide quality live
Shakespearean theatre available to anyone in any location, MSC is also
the curator of the most historically accurate theatres and
architecture in virtual worlds relating to William Shakespeare.
Website: http://mshakespeare.com
Press Center: http://mshakespeare.com/press
Blog: http://blog.mshakespeare.com
Playbills: http://playbills.mshakespeare.com
Programmes: http://programmes.mshakespeare.com
About sLiterary
sLiterary, Inc. is a nonprofit organization dedicated to furthering
literary and artistic endeavors in Second Life and other virtual
worlds.
About Second Life
Second Life is a free online virtual world imagined and created by its
residents.
Neither the Metaverse Shakespeare Company nor sLiterary is affiliated
with Linden Lab. Second Life is a trademark of Linden Lab. No
infringement is intended.