The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) has as we speak introduced full casting for its forthcoming manufacturing of As You Like It, directed by Omar Elerian, which runs within the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon between 17 June – 5 August 2023.
Challenging the stereotypes and pre-conceptions related to rising older, this playful and provocative new tackle As You Like It options an organization of actors most of whom are aged over 70.
Commenting on the manufacturing Elerian mentioned: “When the RSC acquired in contact about directing the play, I used to be actually eager to discover it from a contemporary and new perspective; I used to be additionally hoping to work with actors who had an enormous expertise, of each Shakespeare and life.
“Much as the play is traditionally associated with young love, I feel there’s something really powerful in rediscovering the themes of freedom and love from the perspective of older age. I’ve therefore cast the play almost exclusively with performers who are past the age of 70. Allowing the actors’ age to be both very present in the audience’s mind and yet be forgotten throughout the production feels to me like one of the most immediate demonstrations of how theatre can be a place of wondrous possibilities and imagination – not only to seek escape from the relentlessness of our daily lives – but also to create a sort of literal, communal ‘compassion’ for our shared humanity.”
In Elerian’s manufacturing an organization of veteran actors – a lot of whom have a powerful historical past with the RSC – along with 4 youthful actors will carry out one in all Shakespeare’s most joyous tales. On a stage reworked right into a easy rehearsal room, the actors will collect to conjure an extended gone present of which nothing is left however their fading reminiscence of it, celebrating the magic of theatre and its distinctive energy to make our creativeness soar in an ode to younger love, previous age, and theatre itself.
Talking concerning the youthful members of the forged, Elerian mentioned: “The four younger members of the company will act as understudies as well as participating in the act of conjuring the memory of this long gone production of As You Like It. Script in hand and ready to spring into action, they will complement with their youthful exuberance the mastery of their more experienced colleagues in a playful and touching encounter between generations.”
The full forged is: Celia Bannerman (Phoebe), Maureen Beattie (Celia), Michael Bertenshaw (Oliver), Hannah Bristow (Player), Oliver Cotton (Jacques), David Fielder (Silvius), James Hayes (Touchstone), Geraldine James (Rosalind), Tyreke Leslie (Player), Mogali Masuku (Player), David Sibley (Corin), Malcolm Sinclair (Orlando), Robin Soans (Duke Senior/Duke Frederick/Hymen), Cleo Sylvestre (Audrey), Ewart James Walters (William / Charles the Wrestler) and Rose Wardlaw (Player).
Omar Elerian is Olivier award-nominated director, author and dramaturg. As You Like It shall be his first manufacturing for the RSC. A graduate of the Lecoq International Theatre School, Paris, Omar was the resident Associate Director on the Bush Theatre from 2012-2019, the place he commissioned and directed a few of the theatre’s most profitable exhibits. As a sole director for the Bush Theatre, his credit embody smash-hit Misty by Arinzé Kene (Bush, West End, New York), NASSIM by Nassim Soleimanpour (Bush Theatre, Traverse Theatre and a world tour), Going Through by Estelle Savasta and Islands by Caroline Horton.
In 2022, Omar translated and directed the Olivier Award-winning Kathryn Hunter and Marcello Magni and Toby Sedgwick, in a brand new revival of Eugène Ionesco’s tragic farce; The Chairs (Almeida), a present described by The Guardian as “a gloriously fizzy cocktail of slapstick, physical theatre and silliness”.
Joining Omar on the inventive crew are Ana Inés Jabares Pita (Designer), Jackie Shemesh (Lighting), Will Gregory (Music), Elena Peña (Sound), Annabel Arden and Jos Houben (Movement), Tim Crouch (Creative Associate) and Matthew Dewsbury CDG (Casting Director).