Katie: The American Shakespeare Center is the jewel of Staunton, Virginia where each year, actors I’ve grown familiar with (and added on social media) put on plays during what is called the Renaissance Season. The actors direct the play themselves, pull the costumes themselves, and cut the scripts as they choose. They have barely enough time to learn their lines before opening night, and sometimes ‘prithee!’ must be called out to receive a line an actor may have forgotten. The staging and lighting conditions are the same as they were in Shakespeare’s time, as this is a stunning replication of The Blackfriars Theatre in London. This trip taught me from the very beginning that my professors were correct: plays are meant to be seen, not read. In person, the speech makes much more sense, and some lines are funnier than expected. You’re left laughing, crying, or completely enraptured by what is unfolding on the stage.
However, the ASC trip each spring is not solely about seeing Shakespearean or Jacobean plays and gaining cultural credits; exploring the town of Staunton is also a part of the trip. Staunton offers vintage and antique shops, the likes of which I’ve never seen anywhere else – and not just because I found a real 1920s headband with diamonds still in it for $50. There were bookshops piled high with classics, some of the books’ publication dates going as far back as the 1800s. If books and antiques aren’t your thing, and you’re more of an adventurer, just slightly outside of downtown there is an allegedly haunted sanitorium called the DeJarnette Center. While it’s closed off to the public, the museum that owns it allows photographs to be taken, and the imposing building is right next to the road.
This trip is special to me, obviously, or I wouldn’t have written this article. This year marked the seventh year I’ve traveled to Staunton with Winthrop’s amazing English department, and it was just as exciting as the first time. Each year I return, I feel like I’m returning to another family of mine, a very creative one, and over the years Staunton had become somewhere very close to my heart. The creativity, sense of community and attention paid to the arts in this town makes me feel as if I should uproot my life and move there to feed off the artistic energy in one of the coffeeshops, or even on the steps of Mary Baldwin college. Plays like “The White Devil,” written by John Webster, have inspired me to take a close look at how greed pushes people to their limits, and others such as “Anne Page Hates Fun,” written by Amy E. Witting, remind me that life is precious and no moment with family or friends should be taken for granted (Amanda Hiner and I, as well as almost everyone in the theater, sobbed our way through Witting’s play. Dr. Hiner cites “Anne Page Hates Fun” as one of her favorite plays she’s seen at the ASC.)
Each year I learn something new, I see a new play, I take part in an acting workshops, and I fall in love with Staunton and the Blackfriars all over again. Take a chance and end your spring break with this trip, really! Discover your artistic side in a way you never thought you could, enrich your life with plays you have never heard of, or stories of antiques in the basement of stores that look like they’ve come out of a horror movie. There’s something for everyone and plenty of fun to go around.
Colby : When the American Shakespeare Center calls the Blackfriars Playhouse “Shakespeare’s American home,” they mean it. Not only do the performances replicate Shakespeare’s original staging conditions, there exists a connectivity here with Shakespeare’s work and its history that you won’t find anywhere else in the world.
Shirts hanging in the Blackfriars gift shop proudly state that they “do it with the lights on”—and they mean that literally. Performances are done with lights blazing, allowing the plays to become an immersive experience that, in many ways, put the isolation and focus of dark theaters to shame. Just as you can see the actors as they perform, they can see you, and they often rope audience members into the performances, especially those adventurous enough to sit on the gallant stools that border the edge of the stage itself. Every night of a theater’s performance of a play is bound to be different from the last, but that aspect of theatre takes on a different meaning here.
Each and every performance you attend is inherently unique because no audience is the same and the actors can change their delivery at the drop of a hat, at the giggle from an excited child two feet away from them, at someone who looks like they might give a good reaction—I did, during one of my first years, and was met with laughter and surprise from the entire theater. The Blackfriars makes actors out of everyone in the room and that connectivity is at the heart of what makes the trips to Staunton so impossibly meaningful.
Not only do the actors put on plays by Shakespeare and his contemporaries, but they often tackle modern plays that speak back to Shakespeare’s time and show how universally relatable Shakespeare—and theatre as a whole—can be. Two years ago, we witnessed the first ever performance of Emma Whipday’s brilliant play “Shakespeare’s Sister,” which imagines the struggles Shakespeare’s sister may have gone through in order to achieve the same fame in their society. This year, we saw a performance of Shakespeare’s “The Merry Wives of Windsor” alongside the debut of Amy E. Witting’s response to that play: the powerful “Anne Page Hates Fun,” which had everyone in the theater sobbing and laughing in turns. The merging and conversing of old and modern voices, sensibilities and experiences is unparalleled.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’ve never left the American Shakespeare Center feeling anything less than overjoyed at the possibility of returning for another year, wondering what brilliant ways they’ll inspire me with next. But what seals the deal for me every year isn’t just the theater and its wonders, but Staunton itself. Virginia is known for its history and Staunton bleeds history and culture through every crack in the sidewalk. The charming town surrounding the Blackfriars feels like going back in time, and in-between plays—mind reeling and heart spinning—you can easily lose hours in antique stores, local restaurants, and bookstores. Everyone seems to have a friendly smile to give or an inspiring story to tell you or dreams they want to realize and the sun sets on Staunton with the knowledge that it’ll keep rising on greater things day after day. This year marked a decade of Winthrop visiting the American Shakespeare Center and I’ve been around for seven of those years thus far because after that first trip experience, I couldn’t imagine missing out the next year. This trip is one of the most rewarding opportunities the English department offers, and I’d recommend nothing more than giving it a chance yourself.
Contributors: Colby Dockery and Katie Wilson
