By Ashley Bradley/ne news editor
An unusual set design and a woman playing Macbeth set the tone for the NE production opening next week.
Casey Holder/The Collegian
Macbeth will show 8 p.m. March 3-6 in the NE Playhouse with a 2 p.m. matinee on Saturday.
With a cast of 25, the title role is played by Sonia Rehman, a half-Portuguese, half-Indian woman.
“Initially, I auditioned for Lady Macbeth, but then Stephen [Thomas, NE theater director] asked me to read the part for Macbeth, and I was really shocked,” she said.
“It’s hard in high school and community theater being a women and ethnic. I’m really happy to be playing this part.”
She said she is working hard on creating love scenes that are believable.
“The love relationship between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is one of the most passionate loves between any Shakespearean couples,” she said.
The stage, set upright so the audience can see every actor from head to toe, is in the shape of a triangle. This design was not an accident, Thomas said.
“[Macbeth] is about treachery,” he said. “The play takes place on the tip of a dagger.”
NE student Alexandra Latham plays a witch in the play and said it’s a modern interpretation.
She said in the original Macbeth, the witches are dressed up to look like hags, but Thomas wanted to go in the other direction.
“We’re pretty witches,” Latham said. “We’re more about temptation.”
In the NE production, the witches have a choreographed dance.
NE student Brandon Wimmer plays both Banquo, a captain who fought alongside Macbeth, and Seyton, Macbeth’s servant.
He said the two parts are polar opposites, and he relates more to Banquo.
“I’ve got white-knight syndrome,” he said. “I can’t help helping people.”
Wimmer said, overall, the play about a prideful man who causes his own demise keeps the same morals and the same anti-revolution theme.
“It’s a play that never dies,” he said.
Thomas also directed this play at the Shakespeare Festival at Tulane, a university in New Orleans, but this is his first time to cast a woman as Macbeth.
“He says ‘I am a man as much as anyone else,’ a lot in the play, and it makes sense,” he said. “The same problems a ‘he’ would face, so would a ‘she.’”
NE student Roxana Astemborski plays Lady Macbeth and said she finds the role comfortable.
“It should be a huge deal for gay and lesbian couples,” she said. “This play really shows how normal that lifestyle choice is.”
Astemborski said she hasn’t been in a play since high school and likes being on stage again.
She recently returned from Malibu, Calif., where she went to school at Pepperdine University and worked at the college newspaper, The Graphic, in advertising.
“The true beauty is not us. It’s the lines,” she said. “Stephen wants us to discover all there is to discover about the lines.”
During a recent rehearsal, Thomas continuously told cast members to “know the language.” He said the only way to connect with other characters and make it believable to an audience is to know the meaning of every word in the script.
“Let yourself be vulnerable to what others are making you feel,” Thomas told the cast. “Pay attention to the relationships.”
Tickets are free for all TCC students, faculty and staff, $3 for non-TCC students and seniors over 65 and $6 for the general public.
For reservations or more ticket information, contact the box office at 817-515-6687 or neplayhouse@tccd.edu.
