BRCC brings back 'Macbeth,' with professionals

By ROBIN MILLER The Advocate

Macbeth is back after a hurricane-shortened run - but with some big differences.

"We had it on our schedule last year, but we had to reschedule it because of Hurricane Gustav," said director David Sedevie, a film and theater instructor at Baton Rouge Community College. "Then we had to cut it short, so a lot of people didn't get to see it."

So William Shakespeare's classic was to open again Friday in the college's Magnolia Performing Arts Pavilion, with a matinee and evening show Saturday, evening shows Nov. 12-13, and a matinee Nov. 14.

This cast includes professional actors as well as students.

"Look at that," John Farmanesh-Bocca, artistic director of the Not Man Apart Physical Theatre Ensemble of Carmel, Calif., said during a rehearsal. "Do you see how the student actors are standing in the back, watching intensely while the professional actors rehearse their scene? They're listening to every word of the conversation and soaking in how these actors do it. That's one of the greatest educational experiences you can have."

Sedevie and Farmanesh-Bocca met and became friends last year, when Sedevie took a theater group from BRCC to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2008. Nick Erickson, an assistant professor of movement acting in the LSU Department of Theatre, was there, too, with a theater group from LSU.

That was where the three got the idea of restaging the show with a mixed cast of students and professionals.

"It's the kind of learning experience I've imagined since I was in school," Farmanesh-Bocca said. "Now, don't get me wrong. English class is great, but Shakespeare wasn't meant to be read in a classroom. It was meant to be lived and acted on stage."

The professional actors are Erickson as Macbeth, Farmanesh-Bocca as Macduff, and Jennifer Landon, playing Lady Macbeth. She joined Farmanesh-Bocca's company after winning three Emmy Awards in three years as Gwen Norback on television's "As the World Turns."

"There comes a time when you start thinking that it's time to move on," Landon said. "It was like a 6:45 in the morning to 6 o'clock at night, five days a week kind of job. But it was a wonderful experience."

She considers a chance at playing Lady Macbeth just as great.

"This is a role I've always wanted to play, but I didn't think I'd get to play it until I was 45," Landon said. "It's just something you don't think you'll get to do until you're older. But I'm here, and I'm playing it now."

And she's teaching. "I've never taught, but I'm finding there are things I can pass on to the students, things they can use," Landon said. "And they listen to everything."

Farmanesh-Bocca, a graduate of the Juilliard School, teaches at New York University.

He said he cut back his fall teaching schedule to help with this play.

"Art and culture are such important parts of any great city," Farmanesh-Bocca said. "We need to keep this storytelling alive, and this is where you'll find the greatest support for it - the college level. And it says a lot that this community college would put their resources and support behind this to expose their students to this kind of education."

These components combine to fulfill BRCC Chancellor Myrtle Dorsey's mission of challenging students to think creatively about how to combine the artistic with the practical.

This version of Macbeth will incorporate some special effects created by the college's Entertainment Technology division, which also did special effects for the March production of "Metropolis."

"We're not going to go as far with it in this play," Sedevie said. "We're primarily a theater department, and the text is the most important thing in this play."

Written sometime between 1603 and 1607, Macbeth is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy.

It opens with three witches who chant "Double, double, toil and trouble; fire burn, and cauldron bubble."

They prophesy that Macbeth, one of the king of Scotland's two generals, will be elevated to nobility. But Macbeth aspires to be king. Lady Macbeth pushes him. Encouraged by prophecies that Macbeth cannot be killed by any man born of woman or unless Birnam Wood moves, they kill the king.

"I've always been interested in Macbeth," Sedevie said. "It flows along like an espionage thriller, and it's also very cinematic. This play has some of the greatest roles written by Shakespeare."

Joel Piazza of Mandeville agrees. He's a second-year student in the Theater and Entertainment Technology program.

"I came here specifically for the college's program in digital entertainment," Piazza said. "And what's so great is that all of the things I'm learning from all of my instructors are connecting."

Which includes his role as Malcolm, son of Scotland's King Duncan.

Piazza said Sedevie's screenwriting class got him interested in acting, and this is his first role.

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On the Net:

The play: http://shakespeare.mit.edu/macbeth/full.html">http://shakespeare.mit.edu/macbeth/full.html

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Information from: The Advocate, http://www.2theadvocate.com">http://www.2theadvocate.com