Tim’s Supple Dream
October 18, 2007
Tim Supple’s acclaimed Indian production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream combines the astonishing skills of actors, dancers, martial arts experts, musicians and street acrobats from across India and Sri Lanka. It arrives at the Lowry at the end of October. We caught up with Tim to find out how the idea for the show came about.
How did the show come about? Why were you brought on to do the project?
In the autumn of 2004 I was contacted by the British Council and asked if I wanted to come to India and make a show with Indian actors. They were not specific about what I should do or how I should do it. I was very keen, having visited India in 1997 and, having already felt a kind of naïve affinity with what I understood to be certain aspects of India theatre. I had a sort of instinct that this would suit me.
Why A Midsummer Night’s Dream?
Overall, I chose this play because it felt right, but there are a number of key reasons. One is that I had to do something that I was passionately engaged with and wanted to do and A Midsummer Night’s Dream is something that I had wanted to do for many years but had not felt that inspired to do it in Britain – partly because it is done so much, and partly because I see the struggles in the play encountered by British companies. I didn’t feel inspired to take on those challenges – I mean, how do you do the fairies? How do we get the really extreme class differences? We have a big class structure in the UK but actors aren’t that used to defining themselves in such extremes.
How do the seven languages work in the show? How did audiences react?
It is a strange thing the languages because we worked very hard at finding a form of communication that could work for us all. We got used to having so many different languages in the rehearsal space and it became the parlance of our group – this multilingualism. And actually, it is an aspect of contemporary India. I can see why people remark on that aspect of the show, but the point is that I wanted the production to arise out of contemporary India, and the more I travelled the more I realised that multilingualism is the only way. The language issue was more a decision of negatives – what I mean by that is that if I had done it all in English I would have restricted myself to a very particular group of people who had certain training and acted in a certain way. None of the folk performers act in English, none of the traditional physical performers act in English.
Another thing was that if I had chosen just one other language alongside English, such as Hindi or Bengali, I would have restricted myself to one region of India.
Did the highly visual nature of the show and the way the text was translated help with any problems with the languages?
We were very careful to try and get translations as accurate as possible – if it was in verse then the translators worked in verse. If it was in prose then they worked in prose. I didn’t want people to modernise the language - something which the actors found difficult at first. I explained that I wanted a parallel text. It had to be accurate and we needed translators who really understood the way the character spoke. When translations came to us sometimes the actors explained they didn’t like them. If it needed to be changed then the actors changed it, but the translations were very closely and rigorously executed. It is 50% of why the show works for the audience – even if you don’t understand word for word what is being said on stage it’s done with rigour and rhythm, you don’t drop or loose the rhythm.
How did the languages affect your rehearsal/directorial style?
It taught me to be more alert which as a director is something you aim to be. It taught me that I should learn an economy of speech. It was hard, but it became one of the core issues of our work, which is good, because as actors we need to communicate and have a heightened alertness. I did economise with speech as we were translating. I did try to communicate very clearly without translation and I did have to sharpen up my ability to listen. I didn’t have to change my style of work in any way.
How did the audiences react to the show at The Complete Works Festival at the RSC in Stratford upon Avon? Did the success surprise you?
It was overwhelming. Despite the way I have just painted it the reaction was very powerful in India, standing ovations every night, people very moved. It was celebrated as a production but with a touch of mute at the top end of the celebration scale. That, though, was not present in Stratford - it went sky-high. After India I told the cast not to expect standing ovations at Stratford as I had never seen one for a Shakespeare production. Musicals get standing ovations and often in the dance world, but its just not done for Shakespeare. My gut feeling was that people would like it but we didn’t expect it. When we arrived in Stratford the cast were on great form and I remember thinking at the dress rehearsals that it was really good – and this is not something you always know. But this still doesn’t mean that other people are going to think its going to be good! Then, the first preview. A very traditional Stratford audience filed in and it was a really, really moving occasion for us and the audience too when at the end they just stood and roared. These people who see Shakespeare all the time! The cast were in tears and it was a really big event for all of us. I wasn’t just surprised, I was overwhelmed. That happened at every one of the 12 performances. Maybe the challenge for us is to not expect it as we got it 12 times in a row in Stratford!
Expectation now runs high for the production as so few got to see it in the UK previously – how does that feel?
It’s just as exciting as it was. I am not so stupid that I don’t know there is a challenge to that – you need to live up to expectations; but what can you do other than just do it? Of course it’s exciting to have created a piece of work that so many people want to see. The great joy of the production is that it was done without compromise. Of course I want to make theatre that people want to see but my yearning is not to do a musical so that millions will see it. The yearning for me is to do something that becomes my whole life because the process of choosing the play, auditioning the actors, rehearsing the play, putting it on the stage - those things have to be deeply satisfying and that matters to me before the success. Then, when you get all that right, you hit the jackpot and feel double blessed - that’s how I feel about this production, double blessed.
Are you looking forward to touring?
I love touring the UK, and have done so with several shows – Accidental Death of An Anarchist, Servant and Two Masters from the Young Vic, Midnight’s Children, Comedy of Errors – it’s a great and wonderful journey to go on, in cities with their different atmospheres. I love London and wouldn’t work anywhere else on a regular basis but the difference of a regional audience for me is that the regional audience is a good time audience. There are one or two theatres in the town and they are not looking in Time Out to choose from 30 things, they are going to one thing and it has to be good. It’s got to entertain and be of good quality and while a London audience can sometimes be more critical, they can also put up with bullshit because it’s “interesting”. Audiences in the regional cities tend to need to have both quality and a good night and that suits me as I like trying to provide both those things.
Why should people come to see the show?
People should come and see this show because it will show them something they haven’t seen before. It will give them an experience they won’t have had before. It will give them a hugely pleasurable encounter with performers that come from somewhere so different and do something so wonderful on stage that it will give you everything you want from the theatre: an extremely good time, a rich and moving experience; it’s exciting, it’s a great story and it’s Shakespeare who we know we love - but it’s revealed in a way that people won’t have experienced before.
A MidSummer Night’s Dream is on at the Lowry from Tue 30 Oct - Sat 3 Nov.
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