It’s one of William Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies, but for the students at Langley Christian High School, Macbeth takes on a humourous twist.
The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of Macbeth, a comedy written by David McGillivray and Walter Zerlin Jnr, runs at the high school April 25 to 28 at 7:30 p.m.
Featuring 30 students in Grades 9 to 12, including 15 actors and backstage/technical crews, the production offers new acting challenges, as it is a play within a play.
“It’s funny because there’s two different plays happening,” said Deb Jarvis, the LCS drama, film and English teacher, and producer/director of the play.
“There’s the play of Macbeth, and so the actors had to come to a deep understanding of the story of Macbeth, who their characters are and how they feel about Macbeth. Then it’s also the character’s they are playing who are playing those characters. They also had to come to an understanding of the dynamics between those ladies, and who’s friends with whom and all of that.
“There’s some real dynamics for actors when they have to deal with, and wrap their heads around, two different aspects like that.”
Jarvis was inspired to stage this quirky version of Macbeth after visiting New York this past summer, where she saw the Broadway classic The Play That Goes Wrong, which is about a group of actors doing a play where everything falls apart.
She is also a big fan of the Farndale set of plays, and was thoroughly impressed after seeing Pacific Theatre in Vancouver stage The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of A Christmas Carol a number of years ago.
“This group that I have right now, I have a number of very talented upper level actors. And so I thought it’s kind of neat to be able to do a comedy — which they have some really amazing comedic timing, and they’re very funny — but also Macbeth, because they have the ability to do Shakespeare,” she said.
“So I thought, why not put the two of them together and give them a chance to try their hand at Shakespeare, but also try their hand at some slapstick comedy.”
At the same time, Jarvis is teaching Shakespeare in her English classes, and sees an interesting correlation between traditional Shakespeare — which originally was acted entirely by men — and the Farndale version, which is acted entirely by women.
“There’s this neat shuffle,” she said. “All of the parts are women, the irony being that the character who is supposed to play Lady Macbeth doesn’t show up, and they coerce the handyman into being the one to be Lady Macbeth. So all of the men are females, and the one female role is played by a male. And it’s absolutely hilarious watching both the women acting like men, and watching this man — this character’s name is Henry — trying to act like Lady Macbeth.”
The sets have all been built by LCS, and the costumes are part of the school’s collection.
Tickets are $10 on Wednesday and Thursday, $12 on Friday and Saturday, or $40 for the family rate (up to six immediate family members).
They can be purchased online until Monday, April 23 at www.langleychristian.com/lcsevents/, or at the door.
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