Kensington Swan season of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead show programme

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ATC PATRONS AND SUPPORTING ACTS

CAST Rosencrantz — Tom Clarke | Guildenstern — Freya Finch The Player — Rima Te Wiata | Gertrude — Lisa Chappell Polonious — Bruce Phillips | Claudius — Simon Prast Hamlet — Joe Witkowski | Ophelia — Brynley Stent Alfred — Andrew Eddey | Players — Matthew Moore, Grace Bentley-Tsibuah and Robin Kelly

CREATIVE Playwright — Tom Stoppard | Director — Benjamin Henson Set Designer — Rachael Walker | Lighting Designer — Rachel Marlow Sound Designer — Robin Kelly | Costume Designer — Nic Smillie Movement Director — Matthew Moore

PRODUCTION Production Manager — Andrew Malmo Company Manager (Maternity Cover) — Nicole Arrow Technical Manager — Abby Clearwater | Stage Manager — Kate Sibley Assistant Stage Manager — Jack Powell | Flyman — Chris Wardle Technical Operators — Zach Howells and Ruby van Dorp Costume Construction and Wardrobe Supervisor — Sheridan Miller Props Master — Kathryn Aucamp | Set Construction — 2Construct Vocal Coach — Kirstie O’Sullivan

CREATIVE LEARNING Teaching Artists — Meg Sydenham and Nathalie Morris AUCKLAND THEATRE COMPANY WOULD LIKE TO THANK THE FOLLOWING FOR THEIR HELP WITH THIS PRODUCTION: Oceania Productions, Tom Bishop, New Zealand Opera, Smart Dress Fabrics, Steve from North Shore Dyers, M.A.C Cosmetics, Vicki Slow for Drape Construction.

The Kensington Swan season of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead is the seventh Auckland Theatre Company mainstage production for 2019 and opened on September 13 at ASB Waterfront Theatre. The production is approximately 2 hours 50 minutes long and includes a 20-minute interval. Please remember to switch off all mobile phones and noise-emitting devices.

Advisory: contains haze effects and mature themes.

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Colin McColl Artistic Director Auckland Theatre Company

Ever since it arrived on the scene at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1966 as an Oxford University student production, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead has rightly earned its status as a great, modern existential absurdist comedy.

With its game-playing, erudite wit, hilariously mournful characters (not to mention the leads from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, who make fleeting appearances) and playful philosophising, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead is consistently rated in the top 25 plays of all time, sitting neatly alongside its cellmate Waiting for Godot.

Poor Rosencrantz and Guildenstern – they have an inkling there’s a party

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somewhere, if only they could find it, or discover why they’re even here.

First presented by Auckland Theatre Company in 2001, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead enjoys a thoroughly refreshing going-over in this new production by whiz kid Benjamin Henson, famous for his theatrical chutzpah.

Huge thanks to Ben the director and to Freya, Tom and the inimitable Rima Te Wiata who head this talented cast.

Thanks, too, to our wonderful creative team who’ve reinvented the ‘look’ of this piece both for a new generation and for those familiar with the play.

Enjoy the performance.

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S E DDON VI NE YA R D, MA R L BOR OUGH5

Benjamin Henson Director

Life and reality, dreams and practice, fiction and truth - what does it all add up to? Well - words, words, words.

And, in this case, Mr Stoppard’s. The playwright is overflowing with a passion for language and for Shakespeare (and all his naughty genius) but, also, for actors and theatre itself, and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead is a circus of wit and linguistic pyrotechnics. Programmed on a punt (one of life’s gambles) at the National Theatre, London, in the late ‘60s, the play made Stoppard an overnight success. The play explores the central question ever present in Hamlet - what is our existence? To be, or not to be?

And it does so by smiling ruefully at the perplexity of being at all, without professing to offer any definitive answers: welcoming the sticky topic of death and its inevitable relationship with life. Rosencrantz attempts to figure this all out by musing over whether life inside a box would be better than no life at all: whether being trapped in a coffin or - in this case - being trapped within the box of the rehearsal room - is in fact any life at all. Do we spend our lives putting ourselves in boxes of our own making until the time comes to enter the last box of all? All are big questions but our laser-like Mr Stoppard, however, 6

shrugs off the profundity of his own work. Following the play’s premiere, when asked what the play was all about, he deftly replied “It’s about to make me very rich”.

It is now performed all over the world and audiences have been consistently besotted with this madcap inversion of Hamlet and its clueless central duo. But with any semblance of plot happening elsewhere, the majority of the cast hugging the wings, and a fallacious amble through a whole lot of nothing - what exactly is the play’s appeal? Well there is, of course, Stoppard’s genius stroke of combining some of life’s most overwhelming existential questions - questions that impact us all - with the downright daft double-act cross-talk-comedy we know and love from acts like Morecambe and Wise and The Two Ronnies. Paying playful homage to the master of metatheatre, Mr Samuel Beckett: if Waiting for Godot is the echo in the wings, then taking centre stage is an idolatrous respect for the irreverent comedy of The Goon Show, I’m Sorry, I’ll Read That Again and Hancock’s Half Hour.

Oh yeah, and why not bung in some Shakespeare at the same time?

So, there’s a theory out there that our dreams are a rehearsal for our lives.

Actors innately know this; life’s a gift and they get to practise, not only their own dreams but an inexhaustible canon of other people’s. In fact, for theatre folk, the daily grind consists of toying around with imagined realities and make-believe: constantly grappling with the paradox of making a whole bunch of made-up stuff seem very, very real.

For a time at least. And that time in the rehearsal room becomes a unique journey, much like life. We search for meaning; we choose to believe what’s in front of us - or not. We re-examine, and adapt, who we even are. We forge ahead with the hope that it all means something: a single assumption that makes our existence viable, that someone is watching. And, within that rehearsal room, a kind of reality is created and shared. That is what we’ve made for you here - a recreated practise space, within a stage, within a theatre, for a play that explores a play within a play based on Shakespeare’s dossier on acting and theatre.

Hmmm, meta. So much so, Stoppard has mutated the actor’s dream - an eternal life within the theatre - into a nightmare: a character perpetually trapped in a scant sub-plot.

And so, is it better to live life in a box or not at all? From being given the opportunity to present this work to you; from laughing daily in the face of life’s engulfing, but ultimately, daft, questions; from having the honour of mucking about with this stellar creative team to build this world within a world; from playing around with this sparkling cohort of actors: I choose box.

“Don’t you see?! We’re actors we’re the opposite of people!”

T H E P L AY E R

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Cast TOM CLARKE Rosencrantz Tom Clarke is a queer actor and theatre-maker who graduated from Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School in 2016. Recently Tom appeared in his debut solo clown show Perry in the 2019 New Zealand International Comedy Festival, and Tāwhiri’s immersive experience Second Unit. He is currently developing Barbarian Productions’ Captain Cook Thinks Again, a theatrical walking tour that works to unpack our colonial frameworks in Aotearoa. Tom’s previous theatre credits include Shortland Street – The Musical (Auckland Theatre Company, 2018), Macbeth and The Comedy of Errors (Pop-Up Globe, 2018), Hand To God (Circa, 2017), The Devil’s Half-Acre (Trick of the Light, 2016), Camping (Parker & Sainsbury, 2017), Wine Lips (Making Friends Collective, 2016), Spring Awakening (BATS, 2016), Courage (Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School, 2015), Twelfth Night (Bright Orange Walls and re.SPACE, 2015) and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Bright Orange Walls, 2014). On screen, Tom has appeared in Wellington Paranormal as ‘Naked Man’ and

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The Luminaries as ‘Golddigger #2’. Tom has won Best Actor in the Wellington 2015 Short+Sweet Festival and, in the Wellington Theatre Awards, Most Promising Male Newcomer 2016 and Actor of the Year 2017.

FREYA FINCH Guildenstern Freya Finch is a queer actor, director and theatre artist. She trained at Melbourne’s John Bolton Theatre School in 2015. She has since created, directed and performed in works of theatre all over the country: most recently, Second Unit (Circa Theatre), Actual Fact (BATS) and Yorick! (Q Theatre). In 2017, Freya received the Best Newcomer Award at the Auckland Fringe Festival for her work on Shabbat Shalom and Thank You for Coming, which she directed, starred in and co-created with an ensemble of talented theatre-makers. Other career highlights include co-directing and performing in cult-hit CAR and being a founding member of Scungebags Theatre ensemble, whose award-winning show Maggot has toured extensively in New Zealand and Australia.

Freya has a long working history

TOM CLARKE

with Auckland Theatre Company, which began when she was the assistant director on BED as part of the Next Big Thing festival in 2015. The Kensington Swan season of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead will be Freya’s first mainstage production with the Company. She is thrilled to be taking on this role.

RIMA TE WIATA The Player Rima Te Wiata began her theatrical life as an intern at Auckland’s Mercury Theatre, under the directorship of Jonathan Hardy and Simon Phillips, followed by training at Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School. 2020 will mark Rima’s 40th year in the theatre, film and television industry. She was awarded an MNZM for her services to film and television in 2018. Auckland Theatre Company shows include Billy Elliot the Musical, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Sons, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Calendar Girls, Poor Boy, The Crucible and Death of a Salesman. Most recently, Rima starred in HIR for Silo Theatre.

Other Silo shows include The Book of Everything, Red Rabbit, White Rabbit, Peter and the Wolf

FREYA FINCH

RIMA TE WIATA

and Top Girls. Rima has had a long association with The Court Theatre, appearing in many plays and musicals over the decades.

Directing credits include Middle Age Spread and The Vagina Monologues for Fortune Theatre.

With Kristian Lavercombe she wrote and co-directed Matariki – Fire and Ice and collaborated with Kristian and composer Gareth Farr for their show This Holy Fire of Love, which toured with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. Rima regularly sings with Eddie Rayner’s ENZO – Rayner’s orchestral realisations of the music of Split Enz. Television work includes Golden Boy, More Issues, Full Frontal, Westside, Shortland Street, Shark in the Park, The Billy T James Show and Sons and Daughters.

Rima regularly voices characters for Harry Sinclair and Don McGlashan’s animated TV series Kiri and Lou and has also narrated over 30 documentaries for Natural History New Zealand. Accolades include Best Supporting Actress for Hunt for the Wilderpeople at the New Zealand Film Awards 2016, and Best Supporting Actress for Housebound at Fright Meter Awards (Horror Film Awards, United States) 2014.

LISA CHAPPELL

LISA CHAPPELL Gertrude Lisa Chappell is an actress, writer and singer, best known for her Logie Award-winning role as Claire McLeod in McLeod’s Daughters.

Other television and film highlights include Gloss, Desperate Remedies, City Life and The Cult, for which she won Best Performance by a Supporting Actress at the Qantas Film and Television Awards. Lisa is a regular with Auckland Theatre Company and her theatre credits include Six Degrees of Separation, Fallen Angels, The Importance of Being Earnest and Shortland Street – The Musical. Lisa has just written, directed and performed in The Next Step – a variety show for Healing Through Arts Trust whose aim was to raise funds for youth at risk.

Lisa is a proud member of Equity New Zealand.

BRUCE PHILLIPS Polonius A veteran New Zealand actor with 44 years in the business, Bruce Phillips has been involved in acting, directing and writing in film, television, radio and theatre. He has appeared in more than 150 productions all over the country. Over the years, Bruce has appeared in many TV commercials,

BRUCE PHILLIPS

the last being NZTA’s ‘Less Speed’ campaign. For 22 years, he was a co-artistic director of Circa Theatre in Wellington. Bruce’s Auckland Theatre Company appearances include Roger Hall’s Take a Chance on Me (2001), and Vivienne Plumb’s The Wife Who Spoke Japanese In Her Sleep (2009) and Six Degrees of Separation (2019). He has appeared in many other Auckland productions since, including Theatre Stampede’s 360, Peach Theatre Company’s The History Boys, Bright Star, A Thousand Hills, A View fom the Bridge, Gwen in Purgatory, Death of a Salesman, Copenhagen and Thomas Sainsbury’s The Family Wilder. Bruce often works at The Court Theatre in Christchurch and his appearances there include A Shortcut to Happiness, August: Osage County, When the Rain Stops Falling, Le Sud, Easy Money and, this year, Elling. Films include Alex, Lord of the Rings 2 and 3, Out of the Blue and The Insatiable Moon. TV appearances include Country GP, Worzel Gummidge Down Under, Neighbourhood Watch, This Is Not My Life, Go Girls, Agent Anna, Blue Rose, The Brokenwood Mysteries and as Len Cooper in Shortland Street.

Bruce is a member of Equity New Zealand and is represented by Gail Cowan Management.

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Photo credit: Andi Crown

SIMON PRAST

SIMON PRAST Claudius Simon Prast graduated from Theatre Corporate Drama School in 1984. He was the founding director of Auckland Theatre Company (1992–2003) and the Auckland Arts Festival (AK03). Over the last 30 years, he has worked on stage, screen and television.

His last appearance for Auckland Theatre Company was as Atticus Finch in To Kill A Mockingbird. He featured in Othello and Much Ado About Nothing for Pop-Up Globe’s 2017/18 tour to Melbourne and has just completed shooting The New Legends of Monkey for Netflix. He is especially pleased to be working on this dazzling play with Lisa Chappell, who, many years ago in the supersoap Gloss, played his sister. In the Kensington Swan season of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, Lisa plays Gertrude, his ex-sister-in-law and current wife.

How very Shakespearean!

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JOE WITKOWSKI

JOE WITKOWSKI Hamlet Joe Witkowski is a 2017 graduate of Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School. This is his fourth production with Auckland Theatre Company, having starred in previous works: Under the Mountain, Filthy Business and Six Degrees of Separation.

Although Joe has a long-term relationship with the live stage, he has also had a very intense affair with the silver screen, with credits that include projects such as: Straight Forward and The Wilds (Amazon), and starring in The Basement (TVNZ OnDemand), Saturn Sheets, An Arm and a Leg and upcoming film Shadow in the Cloud.

Albeit a young career, there is no plan B for this ambitious dork. Joe is well aware of the LOOOONG path ahead. He hopes to, one day, use his craft to help influence a change in the world in order to secure a brighter future for it.

BRYNLEY STENT

BRYNLEY STENT Ophelia Brynley Stent is an actor, comedian and writer, originally from Christchurch. Graduating from Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School in 2013, she quickly established herself in Auckland, working as both a writer and core talent of Three’s Funny Girls and Jono and Ben. You may have seen her in the Basement Theatre Christmas shows Work Do and The Opening Night Before Christmas, or in her own Comedy Festival shows Escape from Gloriavale and Filthy Little Goblin. She has most recently appeared in Shortland Street, 7 Days and Have You Been Paying Attention?, and has been writing for new MediaWorks sitcom Golden Boy. She is a cast member of the long-running, late-night comedy show Snort. This is Brynley’s third show with Auckland Theatre Company, having also performed in Peer Gynt [recycled] and Six Degrees of Separation.

ANDREW EDDEY

ANDREW EDDEY Alfred Andrew Eddey graduated from Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School in 2018. His film credits include the telefeature Ablaze for TVNZ and the short film Imposter.

He has performed on stage in plays such as: The Visit and Once on This Island at Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School; The Great and When the Rain Stops Falling for the National University Theatre Society in Australia; and Where in the World is Frank Sparrow? and Dead Men’s Wars for Canberra Youth Theatre. He also directs for stage, having directed NSFW for the National University Theatre Society, as well as the 2012 Australian National University Law Revue. The Kensington Swan season of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead is his first show with Auckland Theatre Company.

MATTHEW MOORE

MATTHEW MOORE Player/Movement Director Matthew Moore is an Auckland based contemporary dancer. He received his Bachelor of Performing and Screen Arts degree, specialising in Contemporary Dance, from Unitec in 2012. Matthew has collaborated with many collectives, such as Atamira Dance Company, Out of the Box, Movement of the Human, World of Wearable Art, The Juniper Passion (Italy), Tanztheater (Liechtenstein/Austria) and Vospertron (India). In 2015, he received the Eileen May Norris Dance Scholarship, for which he took part in a residency in Mexico City with Iratxe Ansa. In 2016, Matthew returned to Mexico and then to Spain, presenting works with Iratxe Ansa and the Metamorphosis dance collective.

GRACE BENTLEY-TSIBUAH

GRACE BENTLEY-TSIBUAH Player Grace Bentley is a half Ghanaian half Pakeha artist who grew up in the small town of Kerikeri in the Northland region. Grace graduated from Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School in 2016. In 2019, she put up her solo show Woman of Citrus at Basement Theatre. Based heavily in theatre and dance, Grace has worked with Malia Johnston in Rushes in 2018, Jo Randerson and Thomas LaHood on the 2018 Capital E National tour of Odd One Out and travelled with the company Discotheque to Melbourne to perform the piece Fiercely Cool Animal Shapes choreographed by Holly Newsome.

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TOM STOPPARD Playwright Sir Tom Stoppard is a Czech-born British playwright and screenwriter.

After being educated at schools in Nottingham and Yorkshire, Stoppard became a journalist, a drama critic and then, in 1960, a playwright.

His work covers the themes of human rights, censorship and political freedom, often delving into the deeper philosophical thematics of society. Stoppard has been a key playwright of the National Theatre and is one of the most internationally performed dramatists of his generation.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1967) premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1966.

The play came to the attention of Kenneth Tynan, then working for the National Theatre, and it was produced at the National in 1967 and on Broadway in 1967, winning a Tony Award for Best Play (USA) in 1968. Tom Stoppard was knighted in 1997. His latest plays include Heroes (2005), Rock ‘n’ Roll (2006) and The Hard Problem (2015). He has written the screenplays for adaptations of Anna Karenina (2012) and Tulip Fever (2014) and co-wrote the screenplay for Shakespeare in Love (1998).

BENJAMIN HENSON Director Benjamin is one of New Zealand’s busiest theatre directors, forging a diverse career, spanning form, 12

scale and medium including original works, scripted premieres and opera. Prior to New Zealand, Benjamin worked for one of the UK’s largest youth arts organisations, leading participatory projects for primarily at-risk youth, including taking six productions a year to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe for nine consecutive years. Ben later trained in theatre direction at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts, London, while continuing to direct for London Fringe and cabaret circuit. Following projects in Germany and France, Ben was director in residence at the Yvonne Artaud Theatre, Guildford. In New Zealand, Ben teaches in Auckland’s drama schools and is on the board of The Actors’ Program. 2019 marks the inaugural year of The Directors’ Program, the country’s only course of its kind, which has been developed and created by Ben and a team of industry advisors.

Under theatre collective Fractious Tash, Ben has received critical acclaim for Earnest, Not Psycho and Titus, which was then remounted for a sell-out season at the Pop-Up Globe (featuring Beyoncé covers

by New Zealand’s only steelpan band no less). Benjamin was one of two directors to engage in The Engine Room; a fast-track initiative between Auckland Theatre Company, New Zealand Opera and The Fortune Theatre. As a result, Ben featured in Peer Gynt [recycled] for ATC; directed Twelfth

TOM STOPPARD

Night for the Fortune Theatre, winning production of the year at the Dunedin theatre awards; and assisted Sara Brodie on the Auckland Arts Festival production of Nixon in China before taking what he had learned to direct Oreste for Auckland Opera Studio at Mercury Theatre. Ben opened ATC’s 2018 season with the New Zealand premiere of Red Speedo by American playwright Lucas Hnath.

The award-winning production of Last Tapes’ Valerie is currently touring New Zealand, following dates in Australia and Edinburgh, adding to its accolade, the coveted Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

RACHAEL WALKER Set Designer With a passion for theatrical set and prop design, Rachael Walker has spent the past 18 years amassing more than 100 projects as a professional designer. She has collaborated with NZ Opera, Silo Theatre, NZ Dance Company, Court Theatre, Tim Bray Productions, Auckland Festival, Comedy Festival, Unitec School of Performing and Screen Arts, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, Canterbury Opera, The Actor’s Program and many many independent production companies. For Auckland Theatre Company, her works include - The Daylight Atheist and Joan, Under The Mountain, Last Legs, Nell Gwynn, Venus in Fur, That Bloody

Image credit: by Кондрашкин Б. Е. (ru:Участник:KDeltaE) - Uploaded according to the author’s request, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons. wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4958552

Creative

BENJAMIN HENSON

RACHAEL WALKER

Woman, You Can Always Hand Them Back, Lysistrata, The Ladykillers, The Lollywitch of Mumuland, Other Desert Cities, Polly Hood in Mumuland, Anne Boleyn, Kings of the Gym, The Gift, In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), Calendar Girls, God of Carnage, Who Needs Sleep Anyway?, End of the Rainbow, The Tutor, The Bach, The Vagina Monologues, Play 2 and Play 2.03.

She won Excellence at the Auckland Theatre Awards in 2017 for Nell Gwynn in 2016 for ATC/The Court Theatre’s production of That Bloody Woman and in 2014 for Silo Theatre’s production of Angels in America. Rachael was the 2008 URBIS Best Stage Designer.

RACHEL MARLOW Lighting Designer Rachel Marlow works collaboratively to create dynamic production designs and lighting environments. She is thrilled to be working with both Auckland Theatre Company and Benjamin Henson again. Rachel’s previous lighting designs for ATC are Red Speedo, My Own Darling, Sons and Next Big Thing Festivals 2014 and 2015. In the past year, Rachel has designed lighting for Silo productions Mr Burns, Here Lies Love, Wild Dogs Under My Skirt, Peter and the Wolf and Blind Date Project. Her lighting designs were also seen around the country in An Iliad, HeadSand, Valerie, Burn Her, Yes Yes Yes and Blackbird

RACHEL MARLOW

Ensemble’s Bjork: All Is Full of Love.

Her company Filament Eleven 11 (a partnership with Bradley Gledhill) works across corporate events, award shows, concerts and light art installations to create memorable live experiences.

ROBIN KELLY Sound Designer/Player Robin Kelly works extensively and variously as a musical director, composer, sound designer, choir leader, singer/songwriter and pianist. His professional musical direction credits include Delicious Oblivion (world premiere, Auckland Live Cabaret Festival, 2019), Here Lies Love (Silo Theatre, 2018), Earnest (Fractious Tash/Last Tapes, 2014), The Events (Silo Theatre, 2015), The Things Between Us (world premiere, Christchurch Arts Festival, 2017), The Last Five Years (Last Tapes, 2012) and Guys and Dolls (Auckland Theatre Company, 2016). Robin’s autobiographical show Valerie, created in 2016 with his company Last Tapes, has toured nationally and internationally for the past three years. In 2018, Valerie received the coveted Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Also in 2018, Robin was recognised as Outstanding Composer of Original Music at the Wellington Theatre Awards for the Valerie songs and score. Robin plays with local band Fortress Europe, and is in the process of recording a debut album with

ROBIN KELLY

NIC SMILLIE

his band Neon Warwick and the Bethell Gang.

NIC SMILLIE Costume Designer Nic Smillie has worked in theatre, film and television as a costume designer for twenty years.

She has a bachelor’s degree in Textile Design from Victoria University, Wellington. Projects for the Auckland Theatre Company include Filthy Business, Peer Gynt [recycled], To Kill A Mockingbird, A Doll’s House, Paniora!, Midnight In Moscow, Awatea, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Cabaret, August: Osage County, Romeo & Juliet, The Pohutukawa Tree, The Wife Who Spoke Japanese In Her Sleep, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Where We Once Belonged. Nic has also worked with Colin McColl on many theatre productions based in Wellington, highlights being Cabaret, Sweeney Todd and Top Girls. Her costume design highlights for screen include the 2016 Samoan language feature One Thousand Ropes, written and directed by Tusi Tamasese and the Air New Zealand Screen Award for Contribution to Design for the television series The Insider’s Guide to Love. Her operatic designs include The Italian Girl in Algiers, staged in Auckland and Glasgow.

After a five year hiatus in Helsinki, Nic is returning home to New Zealand to continue with her work in film and theatre.

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behind the scenes

Image credit: Brad Fisher

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Shakespeare’s Hamlet Synopsis Old Hamlet, King of Denmark, has been murdered by his brother Claudius, who has seduced Gertrude, the King’s wife. Claudius has supplanted on the throne the dead man’s son – also named Hamlet – and married the widow with indecent haste. Young Hamlet meets the ghost of his dead father, who relates the circumstances of his murder and demands vengeance. Hamlet vows obedience and counterfeits madness to escape the suspicion that he is threatening danger to the King.

His behaviour is attributed to love for Ophelia (daughter of Polonius, the Court Chamberlain), whom he has previously courted but now treats rudely. University friends of Hamlet, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, are summoned by Claudius to glean what afflicts the young Prince. Hamlet tests the ghost’s story by having a play acted before the King, reproducing the circumstances of the murder, and the

King betrays himself. A scene follows in which Hamlet violently upbraids the Queen. Thinking he hears the King listening behind the arras, he draws his sword and kills instead Polonius.

The King now determines to destroy Hamlet. He sends him with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern on a mission to England, with intent to have him killed there. But when pirates attack the ship, Hamlet escapes and arrives back in Denmark to find that Ophelia, crazed by grief, has perished by drowning. Her brother, Laertes, has hurried home from Paris to take vengeance for the death of his father. The King contrives a fencing match between Hamlet and Laertes, in which the latter uses a poisoned sword and kills Hamlet but not before Hamlet has mortally wounded Laertes and stabbed the King. Meanwhile, Gertrude has drunk a poison cup intended for her son. In his dying words, Hamlet chooses Fortinbras, a militant young Norwegian, as his successor.

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Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead… by Max Cryer

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe of 1966 had one premiere with a very low attendance – only six people were in the audience for the first-ever performance of Tom Stoppard’s new play Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead.

Of the six, just one was a member of the public - the other five were critics. Four of those critics were somewhat taken aback by the performance and slow to praise it.

But The Observer critic differed – and proclaimed this new play as: “a brilliant debut by a young playwright - an erudite comedy, an existentialist fable unabashedly indebted to Waiting for Godot but as witty and vaulting as Beckett’s original is despairing”.

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In London, Kenneth Tynan, running the National Theatre, read that review and requested a script.

Within a year, the play was revived by the National. In the audience was Joe Orton, who wrote that he would “give anything to have such an original idea”.

Critics now queued to praise Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead with phrases like “the most important event in the British professional theatre since Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party”.

References were made to its “verbal fireworks and unashamedly literary wit” and “the power of imagination behind it”.

The play became the first National Theatre production to transfer to Broadway, where The New York Times crowned its glory by describing it as “very funny, very brilliant, very chilling” – and it won six Tony awards, including ‘Best Play’.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern sketch by Moyr Smith of a performance at the Prince’s Hall on 19 November 1891. Original publication: Black & White (magazine) in 1891.

Immediate source: Rowell, George, Plays by W. S. Gilbert, Cambridge University Press, 1982

Shakespeare’s version of the Hamlet tale was not the first. An earlier account of the story had been in print 80 years before Shakespeare’s and was followed by two other Hamlet plays in London before Shakespeare’s version in 1600.

Nor was Tom Stoppard the first to project Hamlet’s two ‘best friends’ into a different setting. In 1891, W. S. Gilbert presented a satirical comedy named Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. This showed King Claudius sentencing Prince Hamlet to be banished to England on account of his performing bad poetry… thus leaving Rosencrantz to woo Ophelia.

But Gilbert’s great success with The Mikado and The Gondoliers somewhat overshadowed his offering of Shakespeare satire.

Because the Hamlet story takes place in Denmark, Shakespeare introduced Prince Hamlet’s two close

friends with names based on genuine Danish aristocratic family surnames Rosenkrantz and Gyldenstjierne - both gently re-spelled.

Stoppard’s Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead appears to take place backstage during a performance of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. But the glittering dialogue between the two protagonists ventures into far more arcane territory than the play being performed somewhere behind them.

Every now and then the action of the Hamlet performance moves to include them… in connections which are very disjointed.

The two friends are described as having known Shakespeare’s Prince Hamlet since their schooldays but their converse with him is closer to sycophancy than loyal friendship.

And there is suggestion they are spies 17

being directed by the King. Later ascertaining their hypocrisy - Hamlet tells his mother he trusts them as much as he’d trust “a fanged snake”.

So, Shakespeare has Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s reports of Hamlet’s doubtful loyalty to Hamlet’s uncle Claudius… now the King.

Claudius despatches Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to escort Hamlet to England… carrying a sealed letter to

They roll with the punches - their version of heroism can be seen as awaiting just whatever could happen next.

England’s king, authorising him to kill Hamlet. An attack from pirates allows Hamlet to escape from attack and return to Denmark. But the ambassadors report to the King of Denmark with the line Stoppard later made famous: “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead”.

After the premiere performance of Stoppard’s 1966 play, the critic from The Observer used the word ‘existentialist’ to describe the play’s

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concept. ‘Existentialism’ was perceived as acknowledging just one’s own perception of authenticity - particularly when starting from a sense of disorientation. This was not always generally accepted… there were those in the world who regarded followers of existentialism – e.g. Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern – as absurd.

Stoppard sets his two young actors sailing through precarious storms of self-examination – as they emphasise the randomness and irrationality of the world… or - at least as they see it.

There is fascination in the two characters randomly assessing the people and events around them – often ridiculously. At breathtaking speed, they create and announce their own concept of ‘order’. Betting on coin-flips sees Rosencrantz win with ‘heads’ 92 times in a row. Guildenstern interprets this phenomenon by creating a series of comparisons… but nothing coincides with true probability.

The often-nonsensical verbosity of the two characters sometimes veers towards enlightenment… but only temporarily. As quickly as they appear to stumble on a truth - they abandon the topic.

Existentialist though they may be, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are entertaining to watch.

The play is set in a backstage area during a performance of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, which the audience doesn’t

get to see, except for fragments of a few scenes. But, because in Hamlet the roles of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are not lengthy, they have time waiting backstage to dispute and theorise.

Occasionally, Queen Gertrude, Hamlet himself and Ophelia drift through. But, here, because of the relative minor ranking of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s onstage roles, and their similarity in absurdity, the more prominent cast members

sometimes don’t know which is which – and call each of the two actors by the other’s name.

Both plays - Hamlet and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead - contain exploration of what it is to be a hero and that ‘heroism’ is not necessarily bound to action. The characters of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are explorative and fascinating. They roll with the punches their version of heroism can be seen as awaiting just whatever could happen next.

Take a bow...

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What’s on at ASB Waterfront Theatre Show Me Shorts Film Festival: Opening Night and Awards Ceremony

New Zealand Opera presents

October 5

18, 20, 23 October

Show Me Shorts is Aotearoa New Zealand’s leading international short film festival. This event marks the opening of the nationwide festival. It brings together movie-lovers and film-makers to toast the community’s best and brightest.

The Turn of the Screw

by Benjamin Britten. Libretto by Myfanwy Piper, after a story by Henry James.

Published by Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd.

A chilling ghost story, this is saturated with menace. Benjamin Britten’s haunting operatic version of Henry James’ famous novella The Turn of the Screw is a new production, sung in English and accompanied by the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra.

Footnote New Zealand Dance presents

Black Grace presents

The Clearing

One Night Only

by Ross McCormack

October 31

From the creative brilliance of Arts Laureate Ross McCormack comes a darkly cinematic new work performed by renowned national dance company Footnote New Zealand Dance. Like a beautifully shot indie thriller film, The Clearing overflows with vivid imagery and mesmerising performances.

23 November

Following its debut season at The Joyce Theatre in New York City, Black Grace returns to the ASB Waterfront Theatre for One Night Only. Featuring live music and singing, Black Grace shares its touring programme of four works, spanning the life of one of our countries most iconic dance companies.

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Support Us If you’re inspired by Auckland Theatre Company's commitment to the development of the arts and artists of all ages in our city, please consider making a gift to ATC to help us continue this invaluable work.

Supporting Acts.

ATC Patron.

ATC Legacy Gift.

Applause <$200 Take A Bow $200+ Curtain Call $500+ Standing Ovation $1,000+

ATC Patron $2,000+ (annual commitment)

ATC Legacy Gift $any

A one-off donation of any size can be made to ATC at any time, by completing the donation pledge, through our website, or by contacting ATCâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Development team.

Gifts of more than $200 are acknowledged annually in our subscription brochure.

All donations of more than $5 are tax deductible.

ATC Patrons receive access to an annual programme of exclusive Patrons' events, VIP offers and priority ticketing.

An ATC Legacy Gift of any size can be left to us in your will, to help our team continue to create big-hearted theatre into the future.

To speak to us directly about becoming an ATC Patron or leaving a Legacy Gift, please contact Development Manager Emma Burton on emma@atc.co.nz or 09 309 0390 ext. 266.

Together, we can create inspirational theatre experiences that touch lives!

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TAKE YOUR BUSINESS

CENTRE STAGE

CONTACT WILL ROOKE 24s m e d i a . c o m qm

will.rooke@qmsmedia.com | 021 02612005

EAT. MEET. PLAY. S TAGE YOUR NE X T E VENT IN ONE OF A SB WATERFRONT THE ATRE â&#x20AC;&#x2122;S UNIQUE SPACES For enquiries, contact our talented team at events@atc.co.nz or visit asbwaterfronttheatre.co.nz

ASB WATERFRONT THEATRE EVACUATION PROCEDURE Each theatre auditorium door at ASB Waterfront Theatre has its own separate emergency exit and route.

In the event of an emergency, a staff member wearing a high-vis jacket would guide you to your closest emergency exit. These

routes are mainly through the back-of-house areas and are signposted all the way along with green emergency exit signs.

To set your mind at ease, neither the spiral staircase nor the main staircase in the foyer is part of any

emergency evacuation route. Once you are clear of the building, a member of our staff will direct you to our assembly point.

If you have any additional questions about this evacuation procedure, please contact us.

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Production Suppliers BLACK

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Beauty and Product Sponsors

Preferred Supplier

OFFICIAL MAKE-UP SPONSOR M.A.C cosmetics offers a large selection of make-up, skin-care products and nail-care items.

Visit Smith & Caughey’s, St Lukes, Britomart or Botany Downs.

At Regal Drycleaners, our goal is to help you feel good by looking good. You can book a pick-up online with Regal Direct or find us in Newmarket, Ponsonby, Eastridge and Takapuna.

MAKE A NIGHT OF IT at Halsey St Kitchen, ASB Waterfront Theatre.

Dine from our pre-show menu made with fresh, local ingredients.

PRE-SHOW DINING BEFORE EVERY EVENING PERFORMANCE | PHONE (09) 632 1962

AUCKLAND THEATRE COMPANY Chief Executive Jonathan Bielski Artistic Director Colin McColl ONZM General Manager Anna Cameron Creative Development Associate Director: Lynne Cardy Literary Manager: Philippa Campbell Youth Arts Coordinator: Mile Fane Production and Premises Production Manager: Andrew Malmo Company Manager: Elaine Walsh Company Manager (Maternity Cover): Nicole Arrow Venue Technical Manager: Josh Bond Venue Technician: Johnny Chen Marketing and Communications Marketing and Communications Manager: Natasha Gordon Publicists: Siobhan Waterhouse and Vanessa Preston Graphic Designer: Wanda Tambrin Marketing Campaigns Manager: Nicola Brown Digital Marketing Coordinator: Brad Fisher Visitor Experience Ticketing and Front of House Manager: Gary Barker Food and Beverage Manager: Michael Hemmerde Arrieta Front of House Manager: Ralph Corke Ticketing Administrator: Joni Nelson Ticketing Executive: Melissa Handley Front of House Supervisor: Rachael Yielder Development and Venue Sales Development Manager: Emma Burton Events and Sales Manager: Tracey Rowe Event Coordinator: Camille Rees Business Development Manager: Geeling Ching Administration and Finance Finance Manager: Kerry Tomlin Senior Accountant: Nick Tregerthan Senior Accounts Administrator: Michelle Speir Company Administrator: Jan Pitout Administration Coordinator: Jade McCann Executive Administrator: Natasha Pearce Mana Whenua Cultural Advisor Herewini Easton

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BOARD OF DIRECTORS Chair: Gordon Moller ONZM Vivien Bridgwater Karen Fistonich Isaac Hikaka Katie Jacobs Derek McCormack Graeme Pinfold Alison Quigan We acknowledge The Theatre Foundation Trustees for the philanthropic support provided to Auckland Theatre Company activities.

CONTACT ATC 487 Dominion Road, Mt Eden PO Box 96002 Balmoral, Auckland 1342 P: 09 309 0390 F: 09 309 0391 atc@atc.co.nz atc.co.nz ATC PATRONS Margot and Alastair Acland Margaret Anderson John Barnett Mark and Louise Binns Michelle Boag Adrian Burr and the late Peter Tatham Paul and Barbie Cook Roger and Maryanne Dickie Guy and Nicole Domett Kim and Annette Ellis Trevor and Jan Farmer Stephen and Virginia Fisher Stuart Grieve and Antonia Fisher Cameron and Ali Fleming Rob Nicholson and Ruth Foreman Michael Friedlander Dame Jenny Gibbs Michael and Stephanie Gowan Ross and Josephine Green Sue Haigh Catherine and Michael Hapgood Allyson and Paul Harvey Jessica Miles and Isaac Hikaka Anne and Peter Hinton Ros and Greg Hinton Michael and Dame Rosie Horton Rod and Julie Inglis Sally and Peter Jackson Len and Heather Jury Simon Vannini and Anita Killeen Ross and Paulette Laidlaw Philippa Smith-Lambert and Chris Lambert Margot and Paul Leigh Sir Chris and Lady Dayle Mace Stella McDonald and the late Robert Johnston Jackie and Phillip Mills Andrew Gelonese and Michael Moore

Christine and Derek Nolan Denver and Prue Olde Peter Macky and Yuri Opeshko Heather Pascual Barby Pensabene Maria Renhart Robyn and Malcolm Reynolds Fran and Geoff Ricketts Mark and Catherine Sandelin Janmarie Thompson and Joanna Smout Lady Tait Julie and Russell Tills Pip Muir and Kit Toogood Susan and Gavin Walker Sir James Wallace Greg Blanchard and Carol Weaver Ian Webster Dona and Gavin White Fran Wyborn Annemarie Yannaghas ATC 2018/19 SUPPORTING ACTS Standing Ovation Brian and Pam Stevenson Matthew Olde and Jacqui Cormack Sandy and Alan Bulmer Scott and Louise Wallace Rob Nicoll Curtain Call Anonymous Take A Bow Paul and Bev Le Grice Sandra Greenfield Marianne Willison Nicola Jeffares Ian Forrest Mindy Levene Rosemary Langham Terry Hibbit Louise Mountfort Shane Compton Applause Selwyn Bennet Geoff Dalbeth Bernard Kendall Claire Abel John and Barbara Lindsay Lyndell Simmonds Don and Lyn Jaine ATC welcomes Supporting Act donations throughout the year.

CONTACT BOX OFFICE ASB Waterfront Theatre 138 Halsey Street, Wynyard Quarter Subscriber Hotline: 09 309 3395 General Box Office: 0800 ATC TIX (282 849) boxoffice@atc.co.nz

GOLD PARTNERS

THE CHARTWELL TRUST LOU & IRIS FISHER CHARITABLE TRUST PUB CHARITY

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THANKS TO THE SUPPORTERS OF THE

SIR JOHN LOGAN CAMPBELL RESIDUARY ESTATE SKYCITY AUCKLAND COMMUNITY TRUST

FOUNDING BENEFACTORS, PATRONS AND DONORS 29

Image credit: The Eel and Sina by Jono Soo Choon, Mythmakers at Capital E’s National Arts Festival, Wellington. Photographer: Stephen A’Court

“Our teachers, community and children could not stop talking about how they had enjoyed it.”

Auckland Theatre Company’s Mythmakers project introduces theatre to thousands of children in their schools every year by bringing to life the age-old tales of Aotearoa and the Pacific (and the world).

Find out how to support ATC Creative Learning by visiting atc.co.nz/support/philanthropy/atc-supporting-acts