A tempest is brewing, and it is in the hands of 10 local children to save the day.
The 10 are preparing for their task now - learning their lines, preparing their movements, studying the background and in many ways learning another language. They are the cast of Bard In the Yard and they are in rehearsals for Shakespeare's most foul weathered play of them all, the stormy drama The Tempest.
The production is the annual summer Shakespeare camp hosted by professional actor Melissa Glover and her Shooting Stars Theatre Academy. She took the bard's reins after longtime children's theatre director Debbie McGladdery moved from the city. Glover, once a student of McGladdery's who went on to study theatre at Mount Royal University and work in the professional ranks, was coincidentally moving back to Prince George at about the same time.
There was a thirst for the iconic playwright from within the city's youth. The 10 began rehearsals on Tuesday, some of them coming back for their third or fourth summer.
Glover starts the kids off with warmup exercises each morning when their day begins, but even those are on-task. First they work on their basic muscles like an athlete does, then on to vocal warm-ups to loosen the mouth and steel the tongue. (Say "Swedish wrist watch" 10 times with clarity and see how it feels.) Then she gets them playing Labyrinth, a game that builds over time. On Day 1 it was just tossing a ball, the kids all in a circle, but always in the same pattern to one another. On Day 2 the ball is again thrown in exact pattern, but the kids have to say their own name, one at a time, while making eye contact with the next kid in the pattern. On Day 3, the ball is flying, the names are being said and the kids have to change physical places with each other. There are eight levels.
"When you're on stage there is an abundance of things going on at once," she told the aspiring young actors. "That is why we play Labyrinth - to get used to keeping the mind focused on all the duties it has to perform, but open to the things going on outside your own control."
She then holds exercises and mini workshops on the meaning of words and phrases in the old English dialect, pronunciation, meter, character, stage blocking, etc. These are done with scripts in hand as they prepare to perform a compact version of The Tempest.
"It really is another language, so to understand it I have to visualize what Shakespeare saw when he wrote the play. You have to learn it by seeing it and moving through it," said three-year Bard In the Yard veteran Eli Anchor, 13. "I've seen people get way better as actors, and I know I've gotten way better. I wasn't the greatest at speaking, but by doing this they helped develop that. I love to see people laughing, when we do funny things, that's when it feels the best when you're on the stage."
Glover said one of the benefits of Shakespeare is the archetypal storytelling he was a genius at. Plays like The Tempest are filled with universal truths, and portable themes that can layer onto different times and places than the ones written into the script.
Since the themes - in the case of The Tempest it is stuff like greed, betrayal, revenge, colonialism, environmentalism, redemption, etc. - are so easy for the kids to understand, that leaves more room for instructions on character development and stage craft, Glover said.
"As they delve into the play, you see them lose their inhibitions really quickly and trust each other," she said. "That leads to trying different things with their physical movements or their voices that they wouldn't feel comfortable trying in any other social setting. In that way they start to become better actors and better at their own self-awareness as people."
The age range goes from nine to 15. There are boys and girls, short and tall, boots and flipflops, kinetic and calm - all fitting together as a team and creating a production together that the public will see.
The kids rehearse with Glover every day until Aug. 22 at St. Michael's Anglican Church leading towards a full performance of The Tempest and, if time allows, Charlotte's Web. Performances of the plays will happen at the Prince George Playhouse.
