http://ipraudio.interlochen.org/Anime_Shakespeare.mp3
The Bard Meets Anime
Theater professor Rick Plummer has done a lot of experimentation over his 45-year directing career. He set the story of Sophocles in the Civil War and "Much Ado About Nothing" in World War I. He's even done a "Queen Lear." And now, Rick Plummer may be doing his most outlandish experiment yet.
When you first see the set of Rick Plummer's current production of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, you might get confused. There are paper walls, folding screens and walkways made of bamboo.
There's even a gentle Japanese fountain in the middle of the stage.
But it's not a Kabuki version of Shakespeare that Plummer has planned here in Scottville's West Shore Community College. This Twelfth Night will actually use Japanese anime as its stylistic theme.
Plummer has been mulling over several unusual versions of Twelfth Night for a couple of years: a Barbary Coast Twelfth Night with pirates and slave traders and even a San Francisco Gold Rush Twelfth Night.
But, Plummer says, "This one appealed to me because of the popularity of anime but, more importantly, because of the nature of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night itself."
Plummer adds that the play's larger-than-life characters and situations make it Shakespeare's most fun and festive play.
Twelfth Night was written for a Twelfth Night's end of the Christmas season. It's a wild story that involves Viola desperately looking for her twin brother and a conspiracy to make the pompous Malvolio believe that his lady Olivia wants to marry him. He says that the characters are extremely broad and familiar to just about everyone.
"It's the sot, it's the clodpole, it's the witty maid, it's the arrogant stuffed-shirt looking for a comeuppance. It (anime) seemed like a perfect fit to me and (an idea) that would appeal to youth."
The Japanese anime style comes mainly from the look of the production. No one flies, stretches their limbs to inhuman proportions or produces lightning from swords.
The spirit of the production is helped by Japanese-style music played live on stage.
Anime is simply the Japanese word for animation. But, over the past 20 or so years, it has come to mean a very specific style. It's marked by a minimum of movement. Most animators lacked the resources of, say, Walt Disney.
So, they turned to what's called limited animation.
One popular trick in limited animation is to simply show a static face with only the mouth moving. And that herky-jerky style became an expected part of Anime.
Not everyone was as sure as Plummer that his anime concept would work.
Actress Rae Staffen, who plays Viola, already knew that Shakespeare is seen as unapproachable.
Staffen says, "Then you throw anime into that and a lot of older people don't even know what anime is and so I was worried that people would think, 'I won't understand it and it would look weird.'"
Sara Brown, who plays Olivia, said the whole cast had their doubts about an anime Shakespeare. But after a few rehearsals, she says all doubts disappeared. And she said it doesn't even matter if some audience members don't know a thing about Anime.
Brown said, "I think (the audience) will be able to flow with it because everything within the play is very large and very strange and different. I think it will carry with everybody regardless of whether everyone has seen anime or not."
Neither Rick Plummer nor his actors are 100% certain the anime Twelfth Night will be effective. But actor Patrick Mousel, who plays Sir Toby Belch, says that's the point.
Said Mousel, "I think it's something you put out there. I don't think you're making good art unless you're taking some kind of risk and challenging the audience to come along with you for that ride."