Name: Amy Malcolm
Role in Julius Caesar: Caesar herself

Favorite Shakespeare Play: King Lear. My family is very important to me and Lear has some of the most dynamic family relationships. It shows the downfall of a family when they forget their love and trust for each other.

Favorite Shakespeare Character: Lady Macbeth. Shakespeare didn't write many strong female characters. But Lady Macbeth is one of the most strong-willed of them all. Without her, the whole story of Macbeth wouldn't have unfolded. She's the neck that turns the head!

Least Favorite Shakespeare Play: Merry Wives of Windsor. As much as I love the Bard, it's much more on the surface than most of his other plays.

Least Favorite Character: Iachimo from Cymbeline. I dislike him because he gives me the heebie-jeebies!

Who and what's on your ‪#‎Shakespeare‬ lists? Share & let us know #ForRome #chIdesofMarch

Name: Susan Myburgh
Role in Julius Caesar: Portia

Favorite Shakespeare Play: Titus Andronicus. This is largely influenced by a production I saw at The Globe in London many moons ago. Just so brutal and passionate and insane and gross and IAMOBSESSED. 

Favorite Shakespeare character: Tamora. Also largely influenced by said production at The Globe. She's a fighter. In every essence of the word. The original bad ass. 

Least favorite Shakespeare play: Troilus and Cressida. I mean, really? Go drunk, Shakespeare. You're home. 

Least favorite character: Goneril is a real turd, but I also love her to bits and would probably overthrow my king father, if it meant getting to play her one day. It's complicated.

Who and what's on your ‪#‎Shakespeare‬ lists? Share & let us know #ForRome

Name: Dan Toot
Role in Julius Caesar: Cassius

Favorite Shakespeare Play: The Tempest. It's a beautiful look at the complicated nature of redemption, forgiveness and the desire for power. As long as humans try to be the best version of themselves, that story is worth telling.

Favorite Shakespeare Character: Falstaff. I've never seen a good one, and I think that speaks to his complicated humor and wit and his very UNcomplicated appetite. How do you balance the very high and the very low comedy? Beautifully written comic icon.

Least Favorite Shakespeare Play: Much Ado About Nothing. The title gives it all away, I don't feel like anybody's learned or changed at the end of the play. It always seems to be the one people layer concepts over. Much Ado in the Civil War, Much Ado in Space. If you have to do that, then something about the story isn't resonating and you're trying to force it.

Least Shakespeare Character: Berowne. What a freakin' bro-y whiner.

Who and what's on your ‪#‎Shakespeare‬ lists? Share & let us know #ForRome

Loving borrowed from the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts' Share Shakespeare: “A More Personal Connection” exhibit, we asked Julius Caesar director Lavina Jadhwani about her relationship with Billy Shakes:

Name: Sophie Scanlon
Role in Julius Caesar: Female Understudy

Favorite Shakespeare play: Today it's Twelfth Night. Yesterday is was Romeo and Juliet. Who know what it'll be tomorrow! 

Favorite Shakespeare Character: Viola from Twelfth Night. I can't get enough of her! She's brilliant, vulnerable, hilarious and savvy. 

Least Favorite Shakespeare Play: Taming of the Shrew. Sure it was a comedy product of its time ... But I don't find "taming" a woman sexy or funny! Sue me! 

Least Favorite Shakespeare Character: If I'm going with the way they are written, Petrucio from Shrew. If I'm going with how evil or cruel someone is, I would absolutely say Tamora from Titus Andronicus. Pure evil, that one is. 

Who and what's on your ‪#‎Shakespeare‬ lists? Share & let us know #ForRome #chIdesofMarch

Brown Paper Box Co. opens its 2016/2017 season with Mary’z with a “Z,” a cover-to-cover tribute to 1972's Emmy-winning "Liza With a 'Z'" broadcast featuring BPBCo. members, alumni, and fresh faces presenting & reinventing Bob Fosse & Marvin Hamlisch's set-list in its entirety. The evening begins with Kander and Ebb's "Yes" and ends with a 5-song Cabaret medley. Mixed in are a plethora of standards, show tunes, and numbers written specifically for Ms. Minnelli.

Classic songz. New arrangementz. 44 yearz later.

"From high school screw-ups and springtime loves, our cabarets have stretched a wide range of topics from a wide range of performers,” say coordinators M. William Panek and Justin Harner. “For Mary’z with a ‘Z,’ we want to bring something familiar yet new to our audiences. Liza with a 'Z' is one of the greatest TV concerts of all-time, so the ability to share thirteen local performers' interpretations of her classic set list at Mary's Attic in Andersonville is 'simply grand!'"

For tickets, please visit www.brownpaperbox.org. $10 in advance. $15 at the door.

The current cast of Lizas include T.J. Anderson* (Julius Caesar and [title of show], BPBCo.), Alexis Bevels (Dixie Wins a Talent Show While Alexis Bevels Stage Manages, Berlin Nightclub; Co-host of Night of 100 Drag Queens 2015, Sidetrack the Video Bar), Lindsey Charles (lead singer of The Cell Phones; Various projects for Knife and Fork), Johnny Kyle Cook (Heathers, Kokandy; A New Brain, BPBCo.), Megan Ensley (Sketch performer, Stage 773 & Second City Training Center; Singer with the band the Mashed Potatoes), Veronica Garza (Heathers, Kokandy; Side Show, Porchlight), David Geinosky (Cabaret, Brightside Theatre; Reefer Madness! The Musical, BPBCo.), Justin Harner* (Triassic Parq, Circle Theatre; [title of show], BPBCo.), David Lipschutz* (Company member, Hell in a Handbag; Design For Living, Pride Films & Plays). Anna Schutz* ([title of show]and A New Brain, BPBCo.), Dan Toot (Julius Caesar, BPBCo.; Romeo and Juliet, Notre Dame Shakespeare), Vahishta Vafadari (Julius Caesar, BPBCo; A Widow of No Importance, Rasaka Theatre Company), Jillian Kate Weingart (Cabaret, Brightside Theater; Spike Heels and A New Brain, BPBCo.), and Damian Wille* (Haymarket, Underscore Theatre Company; [title of show], BPBCo.).

Mary’z with a “Z” is coordinated by Justin Harner* & M. William Panek*, with an original poster design by Charlie Sheets*.

*denotes Brown Paper Box Co. company member

Name: Justin Harner
Role in Julius Caesar: Male Understudy

Favorite Shakespeare Play: The Tempest - It's such a feel-good play, especially if you picture Shakespeare getting older, his beard starting to gray, and writing about redemption.

Favorite Shakespeare character: Earl of Gloucester. I've got a soft spot for blind old men.

Least favorite Shakespeare play: The Two Gentlemen of Verona. I can confidently say that it's the only time a new author has improved upon Shakespeare, with a mashup with the Big Lebowski. See Two Gentlemen of Lebowski: A Most Excellent Comedie and Tragical Romance.

Least favorite character: Caesar...[s]he had it coming.

Who and what's on your ‪#‎Shakespeare‬ lists? Share & let us know #ForRome #chIdesofMarch

Two questions actors get asked a lot (and some dread it) are:

1) How do you memorize all those lines? 
This is a legitimate question. I hate being asked this because I don't have an answer, honestly. Or at least an answer that would make sense to anyone other than myself. I'd love to say "I just stick the script under my pillow at night and the lines seep in!" Believe me, I've tried....

AND

2) How do you approach your character as an actor? (Also known as "What's your process?")
Honestly, I haven't solidified my own process for each show yet. I'm still discovering myself not only as an actor, but as a person. I've had some rituals that have worked for some shows, but not for others. But I'm still growing and changing and embracing that. 

ANSWER THE QUESTION, MALCOM....

I was terrified going into rehearsals. I mean....JULIUS CAESAR....!? Lord help me. I have researched this guy and know how much of a powerful warrior yet huge hot-head he is. 

HE. 
​But I'm a she...how am I going to do this and not come off like I'm trying to play a dude? 

At the beginning of our rehearsal process, our director, Lavina Jadhwani, said something that really stuck with me. She said she wanted all of us to bring our own truths to the characters. First thought: OH CRAP WHAT IS MY TRUTH? I mean, I love mac & cheese....that's a truth....but....So, that's where I started. Finding my truth. Questions I began to ask myself before each rehearsal (with my other characters in mind as well as Caesar):

• How are you feeling right now?
• How do you feel about the people around you?
• What do you want to happen right now?
• What are my relationships to these people I'm talking with?

I slowly learned how much I liked to control everything, mostly myself. I'd pre-plan the crap out of a scene before I was even on my feet looking the other actor in the face. I like-a duh control, ya'll. Why? Then it dawned on me. I DON'T WANT TO FAIL. (Oh yea, that again...) EVER. AS AN ACTOR, WOMAN, WIFE, DAUGHTER, FRIEND. And Caesar is always in complete control which means she never fails....RIGHT!? Wrong. 

​After this realization, I forced myself not to pre-plan anything. To listen, I mean REALLY LISTEN to my scene partner and hold them accountable and own whatever feelings I had in that moment and allow those feelings to change. Whether it be in the scene or from one rehearsal to the next. I began to find out what worked and what didn't and why. I was also able to call BULLS#@! on myself if it didn't feel authentic. And when I let go of those reigns and allowed myself to fail, I started learning a lot about the character and how much we have in common. 

For each day, each rehearsal, I continue to let go of the reigns and trust myself. That the most interesting journeys are the ones we have no control over. (Is that why we like roller coasters?)
So, maybe this should be my process. For every show. It all boils down to trusting yourself which isn't something one would forget. But it often is. 

As my past training at School at Steppenwolf has drilled into me...
I AM ENOUGH.

Whether it be me playing a part originally written as a woman or a man, I don't need to pretend to be something I'm not. Feelings and truths aren't gender specific, friends.
​
Now I'm going to go eat mac & cheese (gluten-free) because for some reason I'm craving it...

- Amy Malcom

Over the last 12 months, I’ve learned a lot about what it means to be a woman in a leadership position who uses the word, “No.” As a director, I subscribe to Dexter Bullard’s philosophy of “three weeks of yes, one week of no.” I think it’s important that the director defines the world of the play for the whole team, and then allows room for her collaborators to play, test out ideas, and then edit with them as needed. Most of the time, that philosophy is successful – but every now and then I encounter a surprising amount of push back when it comes time to say “no.”

Lately I’ve been asking myself – would I encounter those same challenges if I were a man saying, “No”? The man who says “no” is usually described as firm, commanding, authoritative. Those same qualities, exhibited in a woman, are often described as pushy, bitchy, and (dare I say it) tyrannical?

The impulse to cast a female actor in the role of Caesar came from wanting to reframe Shakespeare’s use of the words “weak” and “womanish,” which are synonymous in this text. But in the last week of this process, I found myself hearing “this Caesar was a tyrant” in a new light. I tend to speak in terms of story (and per Katie Mitchell’s excellent advice, “make the text the mediator of any conflict”); but sometimes when I advocate for what the production demands, I feel like I come off as the demanding one. And again, I can’t help but wonder – would the man who speaks as matter-of-factly about the text or the process be perceived as demanding, or simply strong?

My negotiation professor at Carnegie Mellon, Linda Babcock (author of Women Don’t Ask: Negotiation and the Gender Divide), theorizes that masculine negotiators are able to separate their personal relationships from their business transactions, whereas for feminine negotiators, the two are inseparable. (Please note: “masculine” and “feminine,” not “male” and “female.”) I used to fall into the latter category, but these days it’s more the former. (Another Mitchell adage: “keep the boundaries between the actors’ private lives and the work clear.” Same goes for directors.) The advantage of this is that it makes professional decisions easier for me – less pathos, more ethos and logos, as it were. The downside is that this approach has been perceived as heartless or unsympathetic at times.

Simply put, we live in a culture where it’s unsettling when a woman takes up more space than a man. Amy Malcom is boldly exploring this idea as Caesar, and has inspired me personally to become braver, even unapologetic about my leadership style. “Do not worry about being liked,” is another Mitchell adage (though again – I wonder if she would think to include rule that if she were a man).

Dan Toot, as Cassius, has one of the hardest jobs in this play: sinking into the given that, in our version of this text, his character does not want to live in a world that’s run by a woman. Though this Caesar is ultimately a feminist production, it requires the whole team to explore some uncomfortable, anti-feminist behaviors. I said to the cast during table work, “If this production lives in the world we want to live in, as opposed to the world we do live in, the play ceases to be relevant.” They have all bravely risen to this challenge.

As we approach opening, I’m realizing that’s the takeaway for me personally as well. As a woman of color in a leadership position, my task is not to lament the fact that our society isn’t as progressive as it should be, but rather to acknowledge and address the unfairness I encounter with grace, generosity, and humor when possible. Abie Irabor (Casca, Messala, Citizen #1 – who she has named Athena) and I have found several moments in our production where her characters acknowledge a gender bias on stage. Those moments are the beginning of a conversation we hope you’ll continue after you leave the theater.

I’m reminded of a quote from a West Wing episode that I recently re-watched (this one’s for you, Dan Cobbler – S3E7): “How do you keep fighting the smaller injustices, when they're all from the mother of injustices?” The answer: “What’s the alternative?”

I hope you’ll come see Julius Caesar and engage with us about the framing of this play. When BPBCo. and I started talking about this project, it was inevitable that we’d be in conversation with Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. But for me today, this production is about so much more than that.

Lavina Jadhwani
Julius Caesar, Director & Adaptor