Featured: Tanner Morton and Stephanie Lathrop
Andrea Diaz
Reporter
The Idaho State University theatre department recently performed “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, a play by William Shakespeare. The play follows four Athenians, two men and two women, that fall in love with each other and are subjected to trickery by the fairies in the forest. This play was certainly unique as far as the plot, characters and the added aspect of masks and social distancing amid the play.
The two female characters are Helena (played by Rachel Guerra) and Hermia (played by Tapaynga Hill) and the two male characters are Demetrius (played by Devon Burningham) and Lysander (played by Preston Edwards).
Hermia is in love with Lysander and Helena is in love with Demetrius, but Demetrius is not in love with Helena. Hermia’s father, Egeus, insists that she marry Demetrius and her choice is to either marry him or become a nun. Lysander and Hermia elope into the woods, but before that, they tell Helena who then tells Demetrius about their plans. Demetrius heads into the woods to find them and stop them with Helena following him.
In the woods, the four are subjected to love potions to help them fall in love with one another by the fairy king Oberon (played by Tanner Morton) and his servant, Puck (played by Hope Fitzgerald). The fairy queen, Titania (played by Stephanie Lathrop), is also subjected to this trickery. After many mix-ups with the potions and people falling in love with the wrong people, all is eventually made right and Hermia marries Lysander and Helena marries Demetrius.
A theater group is also set to perform at this wedding, which they do horribly. They are intended to be the comedic relief with their intentionally poor acting and they truly made me laugh.
Some performances especially stood out to me. Rachel Gurrera, who plays Helena, and Hope Fitzgerald, who plays Puck were especially fantastic. They seemed to steal every scene they were in and they played their characters very well. Gurerra played the part of the hopeful romantic always clinging onto Demetrius desperate for love, perfectly and Fitzgerald played the mischievous and playful little Puck with such enthusiasm that was spot on.
The production itself was an interesting one as all the actors wore masks the entire play. According to the playbill for the play, director, Norm Schroder says, “In the early summer, I developed a concept to frame the show and explain why we would be wearing masks and following some strange staging practices. We’d set the show in “Athens Township, U.S.A.” a fictional rural village in the upper midwest.”
Due to the setting, the four Athenians and the amateur theatre company were dressed in more modern clothing. A couple of other things that were added due to the pandemic was an added character named “COVID-19 safety officer” played by Ava Wilkey that would go around and give the actors hand sanitizer and jokes about wearing a mask.
The masks did muffle some of the actors’ speaking and in some scenes, it was hard to hear what they were saying.
I watched the play over the YouTube livestream and it was better than I expected. The camera would transition to different angles depending on what side of the stage the scene was taking place and it would also zoom in and out to give the viewer a better look at what was going on. These transitions were smooth and helped me get a better viewing experience.
However, I do wish that there was a camera that could have been closer so I could better see the actors. The lack of being able to see the actors left something to be desired.
Overall, I have been to many plays in person and love the atmosphere that viewing a play in person gives. I did lose a lot of that experience by viewing it over the livestream. However, if you would prefer to view the play in person the ISU Theatre Department is allowing a limited number of people in the theater.
This performance of “A Midsummer’s Night Dream” by the ISU theatre department was one of creativity and adaptability. It showed the department’s ability to create a great performance amidst a pandemic, and do it well. The fact that they could change the setting and create a new character and blend them in so seamlessly with the performance just proves that. After all, the show must go on!
