Q&A with Cymbeline Director Britannia Howe

Britannia Howe

Britannia Howe wrote and directed The Greenshow for the Utah Shakespeare Festival in both 2018 and 2019. This year, she is making her Festival main stage debut by directing Cymbeline*, as well as once again directing and writing* The Greenshow. She has also directed at Cabaret Theatre, the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center, Women of Will, and Innovative View Theater Company. We think you will be interested in her plans for Shakespeare’s Cymbeline to be produced in the Eileen and Allen Anes Studio Theatre.

The Utah Shakespeare Festival: Cymbeline has only been produced at the Utah Shakespeare Festival twice before (1988 and 2002), but you have mentioned that this is one of your favorite Shakespearean plays. Why do you like the play so much, and why do you think this play is not produced more often?

Britannia Howe: The show itself is a puzzle. Written in Shakespeare’s last years, many are critics to the text.  Yet it is a favorite of mine because it reads like a classic storybook. There is a sense of mystery that may be difficult to explain: potion-mixing, the forest, a secret cave that a family dwells in, and sword fighting—a mirror to classic story books. When reading it, I am reminded of the classic sketches of artist Arthur Rackham, who illustrated King Arthur, Sleeping Beauty, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

I also think that audiences will recognize Shakespeare’s tropes and symbols as they sit and enjoy Cymbeline for the first time. What I mean by this is that Cymbeline is full of plot points, props, and tricks from other Shakespeare work. There is a myriad of these examples: two lovers marry in secret (Romeo and Juliet), a woman protagonist dressed as a man (As You Like It), a deep sleep poison (Romeo and Juliet), a complicated father–youngest daughter relationship (King Lear), Iachimo’s deceptions and his name (Iago in Othello), lost children reunited (The Winter’s Tale), and a daughter lost and reunited with her father (Pericles). I’m excited for audiences to seek these out without prompting. Audiences will find familiarity and lean in.

Because it is a tragi-comedy, I could see that many theatres may find it difficult to label and produce. The first half of the show feels more comedy, but one of Shakespeare’s strengths is using antithesis; so the play has tragedy, too; and it ends with a family reuniting.

The Festival: You are designing this production as a “trunk show.” Can you explain what that is and why you are presenting the play in this manner?

Howe: A trunk show is a play with few actors, where the only props and costumes used are contained in a single trunk. From the beginning I have imagined Cymbeline as a “manuscript of wonder.” The story unfolds as the actors speak Shakespeare’s text and they pull items from the trunks to place on themselves. It is as if the trunks are filled with stories just waiting to be opened, similar to this story that often collects dust on a shelf because it is seldom-produced. Not all objects and costumes will be pulled from the trunk, yet all objects are important for they are tokens for the story. Traditionally trunk shows were portable performances that traveled from town to town bringing familiar stories and magic. This performance is not portable and will not be traveling but it will be performed in the Anes Studio Theatre in an intimate setting. Some of my favorite performances have been in the Anes Theatre as adaptations or time-period changes to Shakespeare’s plays.

 When presenting this idea to the designers I was pleased to hear that they too were excited about a trunk show. As theatre practitioners, we speak of doing a trunk show, but it is very rare that we actually do one. Instead of one trunk, we will be using many to reveal primary props that will propel our story forward.

 I also think that many of these characters carry baggage figuratively, and we will explore this in rehearsal. Actors will be playing multiple characters and this will help facilitate quick costume changes as well.

The Festival: In your preliminary director’s notes, you say “Cymbeline is an opportunity for audiences to come together and understand themselves and their place in an arbitrary universe.” Would you please elaborate on that idea?

 Howe: Families and friends are separated in the story, and at the moment in the play, it may seem arbitrary, or for no specific reason, but we find by the end of the performance that there are connections. Whether it be the work of fate, providence, or deities, the characters in this play forgive and are reunited to find their place.

The Festival: You and your team have cut the script some, which isn’t uncommon at most theatres. Can you explain a bit what you cut and why?

 Howe: Yes, Lezlie Cross, our dramaturg, and I worked closely to make a cohesive adaptation to fit eight actors. Many of these actors will be playing two or three roles for the show, so it was essential to make the play ensemble-friendly. Another thing that was important to me was gender parity, so you will find that some of the roles have had pronoun changes. The biggest script change comes in the beginning of the play. Usually, there is a sort of introduction where two gentlemen give us a trigger event and backstory. Instead, we have adapted it where all eight actors will deliver us the backstory as an ensemble and then hurl us into the story.

 The Festival: You directed The Greenshow in 2018 and 2019 (and are doing so again in 2021), but this will be your first time at the helm of one of our main stage productions. Any thoughts on returning to the Festival in this expanded role?

 Howe: As a young child I would peer over the banister on my tippy toes at the old Adams Theatre to watch the plays. The Festival is a second home for me, and I credit the company for some of my theatre-education. As a spectator I witnessed composition, character, relationship by sitting in those orange seats. The Greenshow is the heartbeat of the Festival as it shares tradition, music, and laughter with the community. Yet, I am looking forward to using Shakespeare’s words, his text on the stage of the Anes Studio Theatre.

 The Festival: Besides theatre business, what is the one thing you plan on doing while in Cedar City?

 Howe: Hiking the red rocks! I mentioned the Festival was my second home, but I’ve since moved away. I currently live in Illinois, and I miss the sunshine and the red rock. It’s funny because the West feels both new and old. It’s where people travel to when they get lost. Historically that’s what people have done, travel West, a sort of pioneer spirit.

Is Cymbeline a Fairy Tale?

Susan Shunk (left) as Imogen and Michael David Edwards as Iachimo in the Utah Shakespeare Festival’s 2002 production of Cymbeline.

By Kathryn Neves

Once upon a time, a man from Stratford-upon-Avon moved to London to write some of the best masterpieces in the English language. In fact, he was very popular, writing horrific tragedies, gut-busting comedies, and glorious histories that had his audiences constantly returning to see more. But after writing these stories for many years, the man decided to try something new: he began writing romances. One of the best of these was a play called Cymbeline.

Cymbeline has always been one of Shakespeare’s most beautiful, and unique, works. While using elements of both comedy and tragedy, this play becomes something more than both of them put together. Most people, after seeing this play, have the same thought: Cymbeline is a fairy tale! So much of Cymbeline seems like it could have come straight out of the Brothers Grimm, with folklore plots and characters that have been passed down for millennia. These are stories we all know; stories we’ve heard since birth, that our ancestors have heard since birth. And it’s these fairy tale elements that make Cymbeline so universal—and so fun.

One of the most fundamental parts of any fairy tale is its ending. In so many stories, a prince or princess marries a commoner, and the commoner becomes a part of the royal family. Thus, the story ends. Interestingly enough, we can see this in Cymbeline—not at the ending, but at the beginning. As the play starts, we learn that Princess Imogen—daughter of King Cymbeline—has married a young man named Posthumus. Posthumus is not a prince; he’s not royalty or nobility at all. He is an orphan who was adopted into the court. In other words, he is a commoner. Imogen marries him, not for money or position, but for love; something that doesn’t sit too well with King Cymbeline. Just like Cinderella marrying her prince, or Rapunzel marrying hers, or Beauty marrying her beastly prince, or the soldier marrying the princess in “Twelve Dancing Princesses,” or even Aladdin marrying the Sultan’s daughter in The Arabian Nights—Posthumus marries Princess Imogen, and the play immediately begins to feel like a fairy tale.

Another theme that can be found throughout folklore and fairy tales is long-lost royalty, or royalty disguised as commoners, while no one— sometimes not even themselves— knows their true heritage. “The Goose Girl” comes to mind; so does “Sleeping Beauty” and “Snow White.” We can even see this in the Arthurian legend, as the young Arthur is raised as a commoner and doesn’t realize his heritage until he pulls the sword from the stone. Shakespeare knew the power of this kind of story, and put it into Cymbeline. At the beginning of the play, we learn that the king’s two sons were abducted long ago. Later on, we meet them, living in a cave as hunters with no knowledge of their royal birth. At the end they return to the court and learn that they are princes. This reunion calls to mind plenty of fairy tale endings.

At one point in the play, Posthumus believes that Imogen was unfaithful to him, and he tells his servant Pisanio to kill her. Pisanio, though, can’t do it. He knows that Imogen is pure and good, and can’t make himself follow his master’s orders. “Disloyal?” he says. “No. / She’s punished for her truth and undergoes, / More goddesslike than wifelike, such assaults / As would take in some virtue” (3.2.6-9). Instead, Pisanio urges Imogen to disguise herself and to flee the court; to run away and go into hiding—which she promptly does. Anyone who’s ever even heard of “Snow White” can pick up on the similarities. The huntsman cannot kill Snow White, and tells her to go into hiding far away from the evil queen and her plots.

Of course, another key part of “Snow White” is the poison apple. The wicked queen, jealous of Snow White’s beauty, gives the princess a poisoned apple that sends her into a deep, enchanted sleep—so deep that the dwarves think she is dead. Then we have “Sleeping Beauty,” where the witch entices the princess into pricking her finger on a spinning wheel and the princess falls asleep, enchanted. This is a plot point Shakespeare clearly enjoyed. We’ve all seen Romeo and Juliet and know about the potion that sends Juliet into a deep sleep for several days. This idea of poison and death-like sleep makes its way into Cymbeline, too. The queen sends Imogen a bottle containing what she thinks is poison; she plans to kill the princess. However, a doctor secretly switches the poison with a potion. The potion, the doctor explains, will send the drinker into a harmless sleep that looks exactly like death. Imogen takes the potion, believing it to be medicine, and sleeps so deeply that everyone around her believes she is dead. They mourn her and prepare to bury her, before she wakes up.

But perhaps it’s the queen that is the most fairy-tale like of all. She represents one of the most common characters in all folklore and fairy tale: the evil queen. The evil stepmother. Cymbeline’s wife, like Snow White’s queen and Cinderella’s stepmother and even the stepmother in “Hansel and Gretel,” will stop at nothing to accomplish her nefarious deeds. She tries to force Imogen to marry her son, Cloten. She plans on killing both the king and Imogen in order to secure her place on the throne. She tries to poison Imogen, just like her fairy tale predecessors. She even has some very witchy qualities: we learn that she used to study potion and perfume-brewing in her youth. “Hast thou not learned me how / To make perfumes, distil, preserve. . . . I will try the forces / Of these thy compounds on such creatures as / We count not worth the hanging—but none human— / To try the vigor of them” (1.5.15-24). It’s easy to picture her huddled over a cauldron like any fairy tale witch. Cymbeline’s evil queen could have jumped from the pages of any number of fairy tales.

Fairy tales and folklore have been around for centuries. We know these stories, and we love them. We understand them, because—like Shakespeare—they are universal. They tell us what evil is, what love is, what power is; they show us human nature. That’s why Cymbeline is such a fantastic play. It’s not only a good story but a universal one— as exciting, and familiar, as a fairy tale.

Performing Large Shakespeare Plays in a Small Theatre

The Eileen and Allen Anes Studio Theatre

By Parker Bowring 

For the 2020 season, the Utah Shakespeare Festival will present Cymbeline, Shakespeare’s rarely performed romance. Cymbeline is a large play in setting, plot, and character—and the Festival has chosen to perform it in the rather small, 200-seat Eileen and Allen Anes Studio Theatre. Of course, performing a large play in a small theatre comes with challenges, but with great rewards. The Festival artists and administrators chose the Anes Theatre because they wanted to reimagine Cymbeline and create a more active experience for this heart-rending play.

Set in the classic country of Great Britain, Cymbeline explores a king who banishes his daughter’s husband to the ancient city of Rome. This diverse and evolving plot is filled with soldiers, woodsmen, ghosts, and evil stepmothers as the characters fight for love, truth, and honor. The Anes Theatre will put the audience close to the action, on three sides of the stage.

“The space is intimate, it asks the audiences to engage and lean forward, the work here [in the studio theatre] is contemporary and takes risks. . . . I’m thrilled that Cymbeline is being produced in this space,” said Britannia Howe, the director.

The studio stage is smaller, creating a more intimate setting for both the audience and actors in Cymbeline.  This allows the actors to interact with the audience and create a more personal experience with a play this large.

With more than a dozen characters and five acts, Cymbeline is not a small production. So this is a chance for the Festival and its audiences to break boundaries and reimagine productions to create a lasting impression. As imagined by Howe and her creative team, “Cymbeline is an epic story that we are telling with eight actors in a trunk-show performance” said Howe. A trunk-show typically uses one trunk to house many of the props and costumes. That is not the case with Cymbeline. The play will have several different trunks and suitcases that will hold the props and costumes.

“Using the device of a trunk show, we will be clever with our elements of artistry for the production,” continued Howe. “I’m very excited about this as the design team and I have already found clever ways to add wonder inside the trunks and suitcases. I also love this idea that all of these characters carry baggage figuratively. The luggage trunks will not only house Iachimo in Act 2 Scene 2, but will solve other challenges the show carries,” said Howe.

Because a studio theatre set can easily be rearranged and reconfigured to fit each scene of the production, this unique stage allows for the play to have a diverse setting, with props and the background more minimal in order to not obstruct the sight of the audience. According to Howe, “Cymbeline is a manuscript of wonder and the design is purposefully minimal to encourage audiences to find imagery within the text. The play moves very quickly through many settings.”

In Howe’s early director’s notes she said: “Cymbeline is a celebration of storytelling. A comedy, written in Shakespeare’s last years, it is full of humor and mystery. This play is about the search and reunion of family,” she wrote. In the end, Imogen “is overjoyed that she has found a family. There is a purpose in having an ensemble-type show telling a story about characters who are foraging for connection and reconciliation.” 

Festival Hires Director of New Play Development/ Artistic Associate

The Utah Shakespeare Festival is excited to announce the hiring of Derek Charles Livingston as director of new play development/artistic associate. In this newly-created position, Livingston will be responsible for re-envisioning and overseeing the Festival’s new play program, Words Cubed, as well as other artistic and senior staff duties.

“I could not be more excited to welcome Derek to the staff of the Festival. His experiences and talents developing new plays, and as an actor and director, will contribute much to the artistry of the Festival,” said Executive Producer Frank Mack. “We have sought to expand our new play development series, Words Cubed, for a long time; and I have never felt more confident in our ability to bring great new stories to stages at the Festival and beyond than I do now that we have Derek’s amazing skills to help lead that work.”

For the past few years, Livingston’s primary artistic work has been as an actor. Las Vegas (where he currently resides) audiences have seen his work in Thurgood, The Pillowman, and The Whipping Man. Last year he was awarded the New Hampshire Drama Award for Leading Actor in a Professional Play for his portrayal of Hoke in Driving Miss Daisy.

Prior to that, Livingston was primarily a theatre director, producer, and new play developer.  He served for over four years as the managing artistic director of Los Angeles’s Celebration Theatre (the country’s second oldest, continuously operating LGBT-focused theatre).  During that time and after, he produced and/or directed several acclaimed plays and musicals; those productions received over fifty Los Angeles theatre awards or nominations (including acknowledgements for Derek’s directing work on five productions). Later he lived in San Diego where he produced or co-produced a host of new play festivals, helping give life to over forty new plays. For San Diego’s Diversionary Theatre, he directed the award-nominated San Diego premiere of Tru, depicting the life of Truman Capote.

“I am both humbled and excited about the opportunity to serve the Festival as its director of new play development and as an artistic associate,” said Livingston. “To be entrusted by this great institution with stewarding works of new, diverse theatre voices, while simultaneously keeping one of the theatre’s greatest voices alive, is an honor I take very seriously. I am eager to begin this great journey of words and wonder.”

Separate from the arts, Livingston has had an extensive career in social justice work. He served as a case manager to homeless men in recovery, a group facilitator in domestic violence re-education programs, an HIV prevention educator, an executive director of a statewide LGBT political action committee, and one of four national leaders for the 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation. 

Livingston will join with Festival Stage Manager/Artistic Associate Tanya J. Searle in rounding out the artistic team led by Artistic Director Brian Vaughn.

“I am incredibly excited to welcome Derek to the Festival’s artistic team,” said Vaughn. “Derek brings a wealth of experience and insight into the work of new play development, and his exciting vision for the Festival’s Words Cubed New Play Programand its continued cultivation of new plays and playwrights within the Festival’s traditionally classical repertoire is a welcome addition. I greatly look forward to his collaboration as well as his stewardship and oversight of the program.”

Livingston will begin work at the Festival on April 15.

Education Tour of Julius Caesar Goes Online

Kenna Funk (left) as Casca, Gilberto Saenz as Metellus, Cordell Cole as Marc Antony, Bailey Savage as Julius Caesar, and Jeremy Thompson as Brutus in the education “tour” of Julius Caesar. (Photo by Shane Egan.)

Isabella Abel-Suarez (left) as Lucius, Kenna Funk as Casca, Jeremy Thompson as Brutus, Daria Pilar Redus as Cassius, Cordell Cole as Marc Antony, Bailey Blaise as Octavius, and Gilberto Saenz as Lepidus in the education “tour” of Julius Caesar. (Photo by Shane Egan.)

Jeremy Thompson (left) as Brutus, Gilberto Saenz as Metellus, Isabella Abel-Suarez as Cinna, Daria Pilar Redus as Cassius, Kenna Funk as Casca, and Bailey Blaise as Decius Brutus in the education “tour” of Julius Caesar. (Photo by Shane Egan.)

By Parker Bowring

CEDAR CITY, Utah, February 23 — One year ago, the Utah Shakespeare Festival’s Shakespeare-in-the-Schools touring production of Romeo and Juliet was on the road performing for students across the Intermountain West. And, then, it suddenly stopped and was called home.

The COVID-19 pandemic had another victim as theatrical productions around the world were canceled. Now, twelve months later, many schools and theatres are still closed and activities have been curtailed; but the tour will go on, relaying a message of hope and perseverance—although in a different format.

This year’s “tour” of Julius Caesar will be filmed and made available free to schools, other organizations, and even individuals—beginning on March 15, the Ides of March, the day Julius Caesar was assassinated.

And this won’t be a fast and easy production filmed on a phone. Artists have worked for months planning the production, and professional actors have been in Cedar City living and rehearsing in a quarantine bubble for weeks. The play is filmed by a professional media company, with multiple cameras, both stationary and hand-held. The cameras will move throughout the theatre, with actors at times speaking directly into the cameras and to the audience. This attention to detail will give “playgoers” an experience similar to being in the theatre with the actors.

“It is important to the Festival that the production has the look, feel, and aesthetic of a theatre production,” said Education Director Michael Bahr, “and that it be visually stimulating and exciting.”

“These are talented, experienced actors, designers, and artisans bringing this timely story of political intrigue and division to the Anes Studio Theatre and ultimately to schools and homes through this exciting format,” he continued.

Festival tours in the past have also included workshops for students, something that Bahr and his cohorts are making available this year through digital means. Live, interactive workshops led by the Julius Caesar cast and crew will be available March 15 to May 15. The workshops were created specifically for a virtual format and for the themes in Julius Caesar. With the help of modern technology, discussion questions, theatre exercises, breakout rooms, and chat functions the workshops will be a wholly immersive experience.

Because of generous funding from the Utah State Office of Education/POPs program, these workshops are free for Utah public schools. Private schools and organizations and schools outside of Utah may purchase the workshops for $50.

Anyone can request a link to the free video, and schools and organizations can request the workshops. To do so, visit www.bard.org/tour, click on the associated link, and fill out the short request form. More information and answers to questions are available by emailing the Festival Education Department at education@bard.org.

Bahr said this format has been both challenging and exciting: “The first week the company held rehearsals over Zoom. This scene work allowed actors to engage with their scene partners and connect in a virtual face-to-face setting. Following that week, the actors entered the space for the first time. Masks were worn throughout the rehearsal process, until final tech rehearsals.”

Students watching the play will see themselves in these actors and the characters they create, including a female Caesar, Cassius and Octavius. “This will increase the students’ connection and amplify their voices,” said Bahr. “Students will hear these famous lines that they’ve heard before, but with new meaning because of the way these actors are saying them.” Through the workshops, students will receive the opportunity to engage with the actors and really dig deep into the themes, plot, and production of Julius Caesar. 

“This virtual and digital format of the tour is new and innovative,” concluded Bahr. “We are proud of it and hope it will allow Shakespeare to teach and touch students from all across Utah and neighboring states.” 

Assistant Lighting Designer Receives National Award

By Parker Bowring

Casey Duke, Utah Shakespeare Festival assistant lighting designer, has been recognized with a prestigious award from the United States Institute for Theatre Technology (USITT). At USITT’s recent annual conference, Duke was named as the recipient of the Jonathan Resnick Lighting Design Award.  The recognition was one of several Awards for Young Designers, Managers, and Technicians in the Performing Arts which bring recognition and support to young designers, managers, and technicians at the beginning of their careers.

Duke has worked at the Festival for several seasons, and this year is the assistant lighting designer in the Engelstad Theatre, working on Richard III, The Comedy of Errors, and Pericles. 

Duke worked for the Festival in 2018 as an assistant master electrician. In 2019, she was hired as the technical director for Shakespeare-in-the-Schools tour of Macbeth, then as anassistant lighting designer for the regular 2019 season, working with Lighting Designer Donna Ruzika on The Conclusion of Henry VI: Parts Two and Three.

“Within the theatre community I found a sense of belonging, of true acceptance for exactly who I am. My heart and my passion lie within this industry, and I’ve been hard at work pursuing this career for about ten years now,” said Duke, as she reflected on her time in theatre and what receiving this award means to her. “This award so strongly reinforces that sense of belonging, and makes me feel like all of the energy I’ve poured into my work and my art have been worth something really substantial.” 

Duke explains her experience through the pandemic and what led her to applying for the Jonathan Resnick Lighting Design Award: “For lack of design projects last fall semester, I focused on gaining new skill sets, making art in the form of previous work and photography, and the big one—applying for the Jonathan Resnick Lighting Design Award. It became a semester-long project, and one that I was proud of completing whether something came of it or not. What a special moment to find out that it did!” 

Q&A with Director Brian Vaughn

Brian Vaughn

Artistic Director Brian Vaughn has acted and directed at the Festival for over three decades. He has directed such notable plays as 2019’s Hamlet, as well as Henry V, Shakespeare in Love, Peter and the Starcatcher, and many more. This year he is directing Ragtime, and we think you will be interested in what he has to say in this short Q&A.

The Utah Shakespeare Festival: Let’s start with a general question. What is Ragtime about; what are its important themes?

Brian Vaughn: Ragtime is essentially about three intersecting families during the early twentieth century. It is based on the very famous novel by E. L. Doctorow that weaves fictional and historical figures across one of the most progressive decades in American history. It greatly focuses on themes of social, economic, ideological and personal change, injustice, racism, political corruption, resilience, fame, success, and hope.

The Festival: Besides being a novel, a play, and a style of music, ragtime is also a time period around the turn of the twentieth century. Why is this period important, and how will you re-create early twentieth-century New York City on the stage?

 Vaughn: The time period is incredibly important as it is a reflection of an era of great progress, industrialism, hope, and aspiration for American citizens just prior to the First World War. To quote novelist E. L. Doctorow: “In a rag, the left hand plays a stride beat, the right a syncopated melody. The stride in Ragtime could be the march of history, an irreversible sequence of events, . . . and the syncopated melody . . . the human life that tries to free itself from the march of history.” That to me encapsulates the metaphorical image and emotional relevance of why Ragtime is important: the people make up the fabric of our history, and how we relate and understand one another is what either propels us or prevents us from our own progression—both individually and collectively. But the most poignant element is that it takes place well over a hundred years ago, and the same horrific events are still happening in our lifetimes. We have sadly only come so far. Much of the re-creation of the time period in our production will be evident in the beautiful work of our designers, as well as the material in and of itself.  

The Festival: We can’t discuss this play without talking about the music. At times it seems to become almost another character in the play, or at least a driving force in the story. Why do you think the music is so important?

Vaughn: The score is so beautiful, and in every way encapsulates the early twentieth-century. Along with its delicacy, it has such an immediacy and power and plays on many, many human emotions. Emotions filled with hope, rage, resilience, sorrow, joy while also managing to be incredibly symbolic of our human desire to be heard and understood. I find it incredibly powerful and profound. 

 The Festival: In your early director’s notes, you write that Ragtime resonates now more than ever, and you quote from the play: “An era exploding. A century spinning.” Would you elaborate on those thoughts?

 Vaughn: I think it’s impossible to watch this show without relating to our current enraged world filled with oppression, suppression, marginalization, and great uncertainty. The events encapsulated within this play are so immediate and profound it’s impossible to look away; and yet what you walk away with, in the wake of such incredible tragedy, is hope and the possibility for change despite the great cost for which it comes. The examination of one’s personal drive for justice and identity and the great rage, sorrow, and heartbreak that comes from not being heard, understood, or respected is at the very core of what is happening within our current world. Through Ragtime’s incredibly powerful narrative, my hope is that all of us will recognize our own personal failings and the necessity to remove our prejudices and biases so that we can move toward a more equally respected understanding of our collective humanity. 

 The Festival: You also write that “our task with this production is to bring the immediacy of Ragtime’s overarching messages of hope, resilience, justice, possibility, change, and, above all else, love into our current collective conscience.” How can a two-hour play can do all that?

 Vaughn: I think that’s the magic of the show. It sweeps across time with great alacrity, and its scope, the characters’ journeys, and the emotional core is incredibly rich and multilayered: it stays with you with profound impact.

 The Festival: This is a big play with many large characters, locations, themes, and songs. How do you create all that on the stage of the Randall L. Jones Theatre?

 Vaughn: The musical is large and sweeping in scale, both physically and emotionally; however, like Shakespeare, we get the most important fragments of the story that keep it moving right along. It’s also an important ensemble piece where each character plays a significant part that is interwoven into a collective plot.

 The Festival: As playgoers, what should we watch for in this production that may help us enjoy it and/or understand it more?

 Vaughn: I just invite you to come hear it. 

Ragtime: The First True American Form of Music

By Kathryn Neves

This season’s musical, Ragtime, is about a lot of things—the struggles of immigrants and the working class, the ignorance of white middle-class America, racial tensions and inequality, and the innovations and lives of several historical figures. It is a group of disparate stories and themes, like an orchestra with many different instruments all playing to the same tune, the same style: ragtime.

Ragtime is sometimes considered the first truly American form of music. Like America itself, ragtime is a synthesis, a melting pot of styles and cultures. It is a combination of classical European music with various African styles. It’s easy to tell when you’re hearing ragtime: you’ll hear a “ragged” beat. That’s where it gets its name. Ragtime is full of syncopated rhythms, or notes played on the off beats. Taking the steady march music popularized by John Philip Sousa some time earlier, and adding ragged African syncopation, creates a style rife with energy and excitement. A syncopated top melody above a steady beat is classic ragtime.

This unique style of music became popular around the turn of the century; early twentieth-century clubs and music halls were brimming with energetic ragtime. However, to say that it was invented at this time would be a mistake. In 1913, Scott Joplin, perhaps the most famous ragtime composer of all time (“The Entertainer,” anyone?), said that there was “ragtime music in America ever since the Negro race has been here, but the white people took no notice of it until about twenty years ago.” Regardless, ragtime emerged as a blended, American style of music—and people loved it.

It’s important to understand the context of ragtime music, especially considering what the musical is all about. For starters, ragtime really emerged from nineteenth-century African American culture. The works of black ragtime composers—such as Scott Joplin and James Scott—became a part of everyday American life, crossing racial divides even in the midst of blatant inequality. All of a sudden, there was energy, life, and movement to music. It was so different from all the other styles that came before it—a true leap in musical progress. From the clubs in Harlem and New Orleans to classical composers in Europe like Debussy and Dvořák, everyone was crazy about ragtime. 

So why is this musical called Ragtime? Why is ragtime so important to this story? For one thing, the main character, Coalhouse Walker, is a professional ragtime pianist. For another, ragtime was the defining musical style of the historical period—so much so that historian Russell Lynes called ragtime “a fanfare for the twentieth century.” Then, of course, you can hear ragtime music throughout the play. It’s a musical motif that comes up again and again throughout the production. 

But perhaps the reason that ragtime music is so prominent in this story is because it’s so symbolic. The musical Ragtime is the story of a coming together, a joining, a union of different people, experiences, and cultures. It’s a story of progress. It’s a story of movement, diversity, and change. It’s a story of disrupting the status quo. 

And what better way to tell that story than through ragtime music?

Who Are the Historical Characters in Ragtime?

John Pierpont Morgan

Emma Goldman

Evelyn Nesbit

Harry K. Thaw

Stanford White

Henry Ford

Harry Houdini

Booker T. Washington

By Parker Bowring

Ragtime is a passionate musical that tells the story of a wealthy white family, a Jewish immigrant father and daughter, and an African-American ragtime musician—and their journeys towards the illustrious American Dream. As both a history lesson and a sobering look at the American experience, Ragtime includes not only many fictional characters but a number of historical figures that represented the nation at the turn of a century. Below are some of the most notable ones: 

John Pierpont Morgan (1837–1913)

As an integral part of the industrial revolution, J.P. Morgan was an American financier and banker who dominated the corporate world of Wall Street in the Gilded Age of the United States. Born to Junius Spencer Morgan and Juliet Pierpont he was raised in Hartford, Connecticut. Working with his father, Morgan formed the banking house Drexel, Morgan and Company. Following an economic crash in 1893, Morgan turned to railroads and marketing U.S. government securities. As an avid collector of books and art, he had many pieces in his personal library in New York City on 36th Street. It is at this location where Coalhouse and his gang threaten to destroy the Morgan collections. His monopolistic business practices stand in stark contrast to the politics of Emma Goldman and Younger Brother who represent the working class Morgan was accused of oppressing.

Emma Goldman (1869–1940)

As an avid and passionate anarchist, Goldman was critical in leading leftist activism in the early twentieth century. Russian-born, she immigrated to the United States in 1885 where she attended socialist meetings before moving to New York City. There she met Russian anarchist Alexander Berkman and plotted to kill the industrialist, Henry Clay Frick. She was jailed and deported to the USSR. Goldman eventually moved to Canada where she aided anarchists during the Spanish Civil War. Mother’s shifts in beliefs and her realization of her self-worth, are influences by Goldman.

Evelyn Nesbit (1885–1967) and Harry K. Thaw (1871–1947)

As a model and chorus girl, Nesbit grew up in the limelight of New York City’s elite. Deemed a “Gibson Girl” after modeling for illustrator Charles Dana Gibson, Nesbit attracted many wealthy socialite suitors, including architect Stanford White. White and Nesbit had a brief love affair before Nesbit attracted the wealthy Pittsburgh heir, Harry K. Thaw, worth an estimated $40 million. They married in 1905, and Thaw became insanely jealous of and obsessed with Nesbit’s affair with White. Thaw shot White at point-blank on the roof of Madison Square Garden, an act giving rise to headlines calling it the “Crime of the Century.” During his trial, Thaw pleaded insanity and spent the rest of his life in and out of asylums. 

Stanford White (1853–1906)

As a successful and wealthy American architect, White was famous for designing many houses for the rich elite of New York. He was co-founder of one of the busiest architect firms in the country. He and his partners spearheaded many famous buildings in and around New York. Of those is the well-known Washington Square Arch, first built to be temporary but then made permanent after gaining so much popularity. Several of his other works include the New York Herald Building (1892), the Madison Square Presbyterian Church (1906), and Madison Square Garden (1891). His life came to a tragic end after he was shot to death by Harry K. Thaw over his former affair with Evelyn Nesbit. 

Henry Ford (1863–1947)

As the father of the assembly line and Ford Motor Company, Henry Ford is one of the most well-known names in American history. As the son of an Irish immigrant and Michigan farmer, Ford dropped out of school at the age of fifteen to be an apprentice at a machinist’s shop in Detroit. Honing his skills in a makeshift shop on his father’s farm, Ford eventually rose to become the chief engineer of Edison Company. He then formed his own automobile company in 1899: Ford Motor Company. He introduced the Model T in 1908, and in 1913 he created the revolutionary assembly-line. He is responsible for altering the American lifestyle forever, putting automobiles within reach of the middle class. In the musical, Coalhouse Walker’s purchase of one of Ford’s automobiles stands as a statement of his claim to participate in the American Dream. The relationship to this car—and the dream it symbolized—ultimately becomes a catalyst for the tragic actions that unfold in the play.

Harry Houdini (1874­–1926)

Born the son of a Hungarian rabbi who immigrated to the US, Houdini’s real name is Erik Weisz. Houdini is celebrated for his heart-stopping acts of escape and magic. He began his career as a circus trapeze artist and graduated to vaudeville after moving to New York in 1882. His wife, Beatrice, was his stage assistant in many of his hair-raising stunts. He became renowned for his nearly impossible escapes from milk cans, coffins, handcuffs, prison cells, and ropes. His most famous dance with death was titled, the Chinese Water Torture Cell, which involved him immersed head downward in a large water-filled tank, his feet secured in stocks. He toured his magic and escapes all over the world, with many of his illusions still practiced today. True to his life of mystery, he died on Halloween night from peritonitis. 

Booker T. Washington (1856–1915)

As the first president of the Tuskegee Institute, Booker T. Washington was born a slave but fought for his freedom and became an educator, reformer, and spokesman for African-Americans. He preached that education, patience, and literacy would lead African Americans out of poverty and win them equal rights. He moved to West Virginia and worked in a coal mine before working as a janitor at the Hampton Institute. It was there he began his education before moving to Harvard University. Washington opened the Tuskegee Institute with one teacher, fifty students, two small buildings, no equipment, and only $2,000. He became extremely influential, and later advised Presidents William Howard Taft and Theodore Roosevelt. In Ragtime, he is a mediator between races and the various factions in the play.

E. L. Doctorow: The Man behind Ragtime

E. L. Doctorow

By Kathryn Neves

In the twenty-five years since it was first staged, Ragtime has become a much beloved and produced musical. It swept the 1998 Tony Awards, nominated for thirteen and winning four—including Best Book of a Musical and Best Original Score. Some consider Ragtime to be the Great American Musical for its portrayal of the cross-section of American life at the turn of the century; most exciting, it’s the featured musical for the sixtieth anniversary season at the Utah Shakespeare Festival. Ragtime’s moving score and sweeping story captivate the hearts of nearly everyone who sees it. However, not everyone knows that this musical began as a novel. Ragtime, and the author behind it, is responsible for one of the most celebrated musicals in America.

Ragtime was written by E. L. Doctorow and published in 1975. With accessible yet intricate prose, Doctorow weaves the stories of a white, upper middle-class family; a black family facing discrimination and oppression; and an impoverished Jewish immigrant family. With this melting pot of cultures and ideas, Doctorow paints a picture of life during one of the most tumultuous times in American history. Intertwined with these families are a multitude of important historical figures; Sigmund Freud, Harry Houdini, Evelyn Nesbit, J.P. Morgan, Emma Goldman, and Booker T. Washington all play significant roles in the story. This is perhaps where the musical diverges from the novel the most; the novel delves deep into the lives and personalities of the historical figures, while the musical focuses in on the development of the fictional characters of the story.

E. L. Doctorow was not only a writer, but an editor and a professor. In fact, he was a visiting professor at the University of Utah in 1975. However, Doctorow is known most widely for his works of historical fiction. He is considered to be one of the greats of contemporary literature: he wrote in a variety of styles and genres, but largely focused on history. He was the go-to author for historical fiction. It’s no wonder, then, that he focused so much on the history in Ragtime. It was important for him to make these larger-than-life figures accessible; he wanted his readers to understand that these monoliths were real people. By placing them on the same level as his down-to-earth original characters, Doctorow made the likes of Harry Houdini and Booker T. Washington seem all the more real and relatable. It’s almost like Ragtime was the Hamilton of its time!

Novelist Jay Parini said that Doctorow “showed us again and again that our past is our present, and that those not willing to grapple with ‘what happened’ will be condemned to repeat its worst errors.” It’s no wonder that Ragtime rings so true today! In our tumultuous times, the stories of Coalhouse Walker and Tatah and Mother and Father feel more relatable and real than ever. Even though the musical is a bit different from Doctorow’s novel, they both tell a universal story of equality, tolerance, and the fight for justice in an America that is not so distant from our own.