William Shakespeare

Directed by Arthur Nauzyciel

February 9 - March 16, 2008

American Repertory Theatre

Photos: Michael Lutch

Click here for my stage history of the play for A.R.T.icles

Hoping to create a highly specific contextual world for such an oft-performed and quoted piece, Nauzvciel conceived a Caesar grounded in the American 1960s (a starting point for the political idealism of the Kennedy administration as well as the construction of the production’s home, the Loeb Drama Center). The visual world for the piece united the innovations in 1960s visual arts (notably, in the work of Andy Warhol) with the increasingly important role of visual media in the period’s presidential elections. Dramaturgical research for the production centered on three historical locales: Caesar’s Rome, Shakespeare’s London, and Kennedy’s Washington. We used YouTube recordings of political speeches and the Kennedy-Nixon debate to connect actors with the oratory of the characters. Stressing the cyclical nature of language and image in political reform, the production sought to parallel the text, art, and architecture of Imperial Rome in both the “Camelot Culture” of the Kennedy years and our own contemporary political climate.