It is a gift and a joy on so many levels, says Sarah Entwistle of her imminent return to the stage after many years.
She will be directed by her niece Kate Low in You Won’t See Me on the Poster, which explores the lives of Shakespeare’s minor characters.
‘‘It’s achievable because of Kate and having the expertise and the relationship.’’
The pair have always enjoyed a sense of drama. Entwistle taught Low speech and drama through her teens right up to Trinity exam level, so she was a major influence on Low from a young age gravitating toward drama.
‘‘Having that avenue and that support to really focus on drama was just so amazing. And kind of solidifying the fact that this is what I want to do in my career and what I have ended up doing.’’
Low, who recently moved back to New Zealand after her United States visa ran out, had been studying at the Atlantic Acting School and performing in New York City.
‘‘I’m enjoying being back in New Zealand and being part of the creative scene and I still have great connections and roots over there and I’ll hopefully be back over there at some stage.’’
In the meantime she is based in Auckland but it was on a visit to Entwistle, a Dunedin voice and performance specialist for over 35 years, that the pair started talking about maybe working together.
‘‘We were talking ... particularly about getting you back on stage because it’s been a long, long while and how we could make that happen,’’ Low says.
Making your own work is part and parcel of being an actor.
‘‘Otherwise there’s sometimes not a lot of work there.’’
So the pair began to develop some ideas for their own work and kept coming back to a joint interest in Shakespeare which they both have performed in the past, even working together on Summer Shakespeare productions in Timaru, Low’s home town, years ago.
Low continued her passion for Shakespeare studying under experts in the United States and her production company, Resident Dilettante, also produces an annual summer Shakespeare festival at St John’s in the Village in New York City.
So drawing on that experience and seeing a show called Sleep No More in New York, which followed different characters around a hotel, she began to think they could use a similar approach looking at ‘‘minor’’ characters in Shakespeare’s plays.
‘‘We kind of talked around that concept and how Shakespeare has wonderful plays with all of these great characters but we don’t always see the full story of a lot of the characters.’’
Sometimes those characters just serve the plot of the leads or the plot of the story and sometimes, depending on the director, might not even make the stage of a production.
The first character they landed on is the porter in Macbeth, who is only in one scene of the play.
‘‘He has this iconic funny comedic monologue where he’s talking about all of these different people that he’s greeting into the gates of hell, which he’s personifying but also has this fun metaphor of what Macbeth’s castle ends up being in the play.’’
‘‘We see Feste when he’s a clown who’s not just performing. So we see Feste as a person rather than just the title of a fool.’’
Low wondered where Feste goes when not on stage and decided it was into a small room or cupboard.
‘‘He feels very interesting because within the songs he sings, there is a melancholy quality to him that sits alongside the foolery,’’ Entwistle says.
From all those discussions came the title of the work — You Won’t See Me on the Poster.
‘‘The play is held by the actor moving from character to character through the mechanism of costume that’s set on stage. So they take on a character, divest a character, move to the next character.’’
It resonated with Low who sees it as similar to the concept of ‘‘sonder’’ as coined by author John Koenig to describe the realisation that random people around you are living lives as central to them as yours is to you.
Low had a ‘‘sonder’’ experience in an airport on the way home.
‘‘I love whenever I get struck by a moment like that, because it’s just like, it feels so inherently human. So that was kind of what was a driving force for how we started to create the show.’’
It was decided Entwistle would take on the solo role, while Low would direct, a first for her, and produce.
‘‘It’s fun to be working together again in a different capacity,’’ Low says.
‘‘We could have got rights to a script and done something that was already made. But it was like, why would we not take the opportunity to create something that felt inherently us as collaborators.’’
Entwistle admits it is a big step for her but having Low, with her expertise there, saying she can do it makes it feel achievable.
‘‘It just feels like it’s time to dive back in. Give it a go.’’
She believes you get to a point in life where you no longer take yourself so seriously although that was not to say she has no nerves about it.
‘‘Every time I thought about it I wanted to go and be sick. We laugh about it, but I did.’’
However, she knows she is not alone in taking a chance and believes the rewards will be there afterwards.
‘‘I think that’s why it’s the gift, and the joy of working with someone who knows you. And you trust.’’
Their close relationship also enables them to speak their minds in ways others might not.
‘‘It’s why older theatre ensembles work so well together. Because they know each other inherently as people as well,’’ Low says.
They are keeping to Shakespeare’s text for the characters but there will be some ‘‘creative liberties’’ taken.
Receiving Creative Communities Scheme funding to develop and stage the show has also been a huge boost.
‘‘It’s just so reassuring as artists. A little bit of support and funding obviously helps the show itself happen, but it also allows us the space to be able to engage with the community more, which is so important for the arts in general.’’
Since she has been back in New Zealand, Low has performed her two-hander How to Build a Gate at the Wellington Fringe. She had toured the show around the lower South Island before taking it to the Soho Playhouse Lighthouse Series in New York City where it was a finalist, making her off-Broadway debut in the process.
Techie Benjamin Donaldson, who worked with Low on How to Build a Gate, is also helping with the new work.
‘‘It’s interpretive and it’s a little abstract and fun. We’ve integrated a lot of soundscape and music,’’ Low says.
To see:
You Won’t See Me on the Poster, June 25-27 at 7.30pm, June 27 at 2pm and 7.30pm, New Athenaeum Theatre, Dunedin.
