modern dress

[Obssessed_with_Orson]

seems like ever since orson did modern dress "julius caesar" on stage, everyone has been doing modern this, modern that.

bye now!

[Welles Fan]

Well, the problem with doing Shakespeare on stage is that a modern audience has a difficult time discerning the cultural "ranks" of the characters. When everybody is in Elizabethan dress, it is hard to tell one character from another. Welles' modern dress CAESAR really did set a trend. It was easy to see Caesar as a military dictator in the making when the play was staged in a fascist setting. One is now as likely to see this sort of setting as a "traditional" one-the Ian McKellan version of Richard III being a prime example.

[Obssessed_with_Orson]

i was kind of meanin' every one has become a copycat of the ideas that orson welles came up with.

even the ways he did things in his movies. they probably think that they thought of it when it was actually him that did so.

bye now

[Jeff Wilson]

Welles was not the first to mount modern dress Shakespeare productions; this was done as early as the turn of the century, from what I understand. So Welles helped make it popular. Unless one has a viable reason for setting it in a distinctive modern period, though, one perhaps shouldn't bother.

[Welles Fan]

The problem with "resetting" Shakespeare IMO is that the poetry of the text seems out of place sometimes. The recent ROMEO + JULIET is a prime example. The actors (or director) seemed to think that the "secret" of making Shakespeare's verse work was by pretending it wasn't verse at all. This simply makes the actors sound funny. Shakespeare's verse really "directs" actors into a bigger performance by its heightened and descriptive use of language.

Often, directors think they're being clever by "updating" a play like R + J into modern times to give us a feel for "gang warfare" amongst the youth. Unfortunately, this is not exactly what the play is about. The play is really a tragedy of accidents (and is thus not a tragedy in the classic sense). The fact that the younger members of the families have started up a new version of an old feud is merely one of the play's accidents.

I think strictly modern dress does not really work, because the verse is inconguous in modern times. I do admire changing the time and setting if it clarifies things in the play, and if the chosen period is suited for blank verse. The Ruritainian setting of Branagh's HAMLET is a good example of an update, IMO. You could tell military dress from civil, aristocrats and court personnel from "commoners", etc. I don't know what exact year Branagh as going for, but it could well have been early 20th century as Fortinbras' troops could have fought in the trenches of WWI in their greatcoats.

Welles, in his films, often deals with the more descriptive passages by cutting them-if the verse is attempting to set a scene for a theatre-bound audience, Welles felt that he did not need such passages since he had supplied the visual scene the passage was attempting to re-create.

I cannot remember the precise year of Welles' JULIUS CAESAR, but I know Tyrone Guthrie directed a young Alec Guinness in a modern-dress HAMLET circa 1938.

[Michael]

I pretty much agree. Bland "modern dress" productions are not interesting to me either. I saw a particularly poorly costumed production of "Midsummer" in Santa Fe--casual jackets, sweaters, etc. Shakespeare needs to be set in a period or place where the clothing can help distinguish the classes and characters. Branaugh's Hamlet works for me too, as does McKellen's Richard III.

It is interesting to note however, that in Shakespeare's time, they essentially were in "modern dress". They made virtually no effort to dress period or for the place. They only dressed for class status.

Thanks! MW

[mteal]

Interesting discussion, all. Modern dress, intelligently done, can add a nice surreal angle to a classic story, thereby making it seem more timeless or universal (or more relevant to the times, as in the Mercury Ceasar, which may not have been the first modern dress Shakespeare, but it is probably still the most legendary). But if modern dress is done just to be trendy, as in Baz Luhrman's MTV Romeo and Juliet, the Shakespearean verse seems pointless. They might as well update the story and language as well, like West Side Story. Ian Mackellen's Richard III was a pretty well done flick, but exactly how "modern dress" is it when it's set in the 1930s? It certainly can't have any of the "immediacy" that Caesar must have had (one of the main points of modern dress, I would think). Branagh, in my book, sabotaged his Hamlet with too many cameos by American Hollywood stars. That's more jarring then any modern dress. And what about post-modern dress? Anyone see Julie Taymor's Titus? That's a Shakespeare film that looks like it could be set in a barbaric, fascist future instead of the past or present. That seemed to work better for me, because it seems more possible. Welles' Macbeth has the same post-civilization feel to it, although more subtle and ambiguous. Also, after hearing the eerie, science fictionish score for Welles' 50s stage production of King Lear, I wonder if he wasn't going for a similar effect there too.

That's an interesting point that class distinctions are not clear to modern audiences when the actors are in Elizabethan dress. Welles used a sort-of similar reasoning I suppose when he decided to set his Don Quixote film in modern times. The absurdity of Quixote's chivalric idealism become much more CLEAR that way. Everyone has their reasons. Unlike many of the others, Welles always seemed to have good ones.

[radioproducer]

Practically speaking, modern dress is much CHEAPER than Elizabethan dress, which is costly if done right, and just plain silly if done wrong(i.e. "fake, homade"costumes). Welles modern dress J.C. made a statement appropriate to the times at least. I confess that some of my own productions in modern dress (like my '50's mafia Taming of the Shrew) were considered innovative when they were actually just a way to simplify and keep productions costs low. Orson would have been proud. BUT- no matter what you do(paint the actor gren and have them crawling around on old tires in their underwear), if the actors are good, and the words are left alone, Shakespeare always wins!

[Jeff Wilson]

I'm not sure every Shakespearean play works in a modern setting; while in college, we went to see a production of Hamlet set in a corporate boardroom setting. How exactly to do you carry off swords and ghosts in such a setting and not make it ludicrous? To top matters off, the actor playing Hamlet wore various rock t-shirts (Napalm Death, Motorhead, and such) as part of his wardrobe, the better to show his rebelliousness, presumably. We left at intermission, thankfully. Granted, that was a terrible production, but it just seems certain plays present real challenges for a director to convincingly mount in a modern setting. It seems obvious that comedies would be much easier to do modern than tragedies, at least. The histories can always be tied in to another time, a la Caesar, Richard III, and so on.