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- The Friar
Rawiri Paratene
Rawiri returns to the Globe after taking part in our International Actors Fellowship in 2007. His theatre credits include, Gower in Children of the Sea an adaptation of Pericles at the Edinburgh Fringe, Romeo and Juliet (Fortune Theatre, NZ); King Lear (Mercury Theatre, NZ); Hamlet (Downstage, NZ). His extensive film credits include Koro Apirana in the Oscar nominated Whale Rider; Man Thing, What Becomes of the Broken Hearted. Television work includes Hare in Dead Certs which he wrote and he acted in and wrote for Issues.
Rehearsal Bulletin 1
Previous experience of Shakespeare
My first introduction to Shakespeare wasn’t that pleasant. Shakespeare was compulsory when I was going to secondary school and the first play I studied was Julius Caesar; we didn’t even read the play, but were just given notes about the scenes.
But then in my later years, I luckily got a great teacher who took us to a professional production of Hamlet in a theatre called the Mercury Theatre in Auckland, and that experience changed the shape of my life. I wasn’t really expecting anything and had never been in a ‘proper theatre’ as it were. But when the lights went down on the battlements and the mist came and that first scene happened, I was absolutely transfixed from then right through. The language wasn’t a problem at all because I understood what it was about. I was a young man growing up at a time when there were a lot of things corrupt in the state of the world, the Vietnam War for example, and the elders of the world didn’t seem all that together. And so when I watched this play, I identified with it and with Hamlet and it sang to me.
And I made my mind up there and then that I wanted to be a writer, rather than an actor. The little that I knew about Shakespeare was that he was long dead but I realised the power of live theatre and of the words; if a man could write something four hundred years ago and it could still be that essential to me in a completely different culture, in a completely different environment, in a completely different time, that’s a powerful thing. I was a person who was very political as a young man and so I saw this as the vehicle to get the things that I wanted to say across.
I decided that the best way to learn how to be a playwright was to be an actor first. I knew that I was OK at performance – I was the class clown – so I finished off school and then did one-year acting course in Wellington, before the director at the Mercury theatre where I had seen Hamlet took me on for a two-year apprenticeship. I stayed about four years at that theatre.
Preparation before rehearsals
Because my schedule has been so busy, I didn’t actually get as much time as I would like to do my research. However, I did a little bit of background work on St Francis and I found out that he came from a wealthy family and that he liked girls and alcohol and the good life and was a bit of a lad really before he saw the light! Although the order of monks he established was very strict, I also discovered that it was an order about community, and about the human relationship with the earth and other creatures. This has a lot to do with my own Maori culture anyway, so at that point I knew then that it was a role that I was going to be able to find lots to identify with.
Initial impressions of the Friar
I think people often tend to think of the Friar as an old man, but Dominic [Dromgoole, the director] is keen to move away from those associations, that the Friar is my age and maybe even five years younger. His first speech, for example, “This grey-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night” (2.3.1) is very light, and I’m starting to think there is a lightness to the Friar; I’m consciously trying to lighten my posture and the frame of mind of the character, which feeds into the fact that the Friar is incredible positive. If I’m a Franciscan friar, my first duty is to do good for the community, and what is ailing in this community is the rancour between the two household. When Romeo, this hopeless case, falls for the daughter of his father’s enemy, the Friar sees the good in it, and so he agrees to do this illegal act, this concealed marriage without parental permission, in the hope that it will unite the two families.
And even when things keep going wrong – Romeo killing Tybalt and then being banished – the Friar has always got a plan. They are dreadful plans with high risks and low returns, but he has always able to put a positive slant on it and he can always see some way through, because what is on his heart is trying to heal the two households.
First day of rehearsals
The first day is the meet and greet. We go into the top rehearsal room and everyone is there from all parts of the theatre. You get some information on some sheets, and some photographs of the entire cast, and then people stand up and introduce themselves from all departments of the Globe.
We’re going to be rehearsing for the first two weeks in a different building, part of the old Meniers Chocolate Factory. Once there, we talked about the process of what is going to happen with Romeo and Juliet. Dominic did his introduction about his process and about his take on the play, and we saw a miniature model of the stage with the set design and the costume designer’s drawings. And then we did a read through of the entire play. So it was all very introductory.
Rehearsal Bulletin 2
First rehearsals: Table sessions
Dominic [Dromgoole, artistic director]’s process is that he starts in the first week with table sessions, where he insists that we need to understand every single word that we’re saying and that’s being said to us. So we sit around the table and we go through every word of the scene that we are in. To be fair, I was really struggling to begin with, so I bought the glossary Shakespeare’s Words, by David Crystal and the Oxford text of Romeo and Juliet, which had better notes than my edition. I made it a routine where I would translate the scenes word-by-word literally, so that I was able to start turning up the most prepared …. much to Dominic’s enjoyment!
I’m an actor and feel like I need to get a scene up and get it moving, but I know that this process feeds into that next stage, so we’ll be able to get it moving now. I can’t wait for that next week!
Research at the Globe
Working at the Globe, you have access to the Globe research team. So we had an initial lecture from Dr Farah Karim-Cooper, which was exceptional, about how the Friar marrying Romeo and Juliet without her father there would have been thought of as illegal. At that lecture, she also introduced us to the research team and to where the Library and Archive was. So I went there and knocked on their door the day after with lots of questions, and they have already dug up lots of stuff about herbs and Franciscans and lots more. I wanted to know all kinds of things and they came up with the answers. It’s a great system.
Text work with Giles Block
Alongside the table sessions, we also had a class with the Globe textual adviser, Giles Block. Giles’ process deals with splitting the speeches up into thoughts, and then we would look at the meaning. I love the way Giles works because he never says, “It means this”. He throws possibilities at you and invites you to find the meaning that works best for you. He will debate it with you, if need be, but he provides you with all kinds of possibilities.
He’s also great at asking questions about why the language is the way it is. So for example, in the Friar’s first scene, it’s the only scene where he speaks entirely in rhyming couplets:
The grey-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,
Chequering the eastern clouds with streaks of light,
And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth day's path and Titan's fiery wheels:
Now, ere the sun advance his burning eye,
The day to cheer and night's dank dew to dry,
I must up-fill this osier cage of ours
With baleful weeds and precious-juiced flowers.
The earth that's nature's mother is her tomb;
What is her burying grave that is her womb,
And from her womb children of divers kind
We sucking on her natural bosom find,
Many for many virtues excellent,
None but for some and yet all different.
O, mickle is the powerful grace that lies
In herbs, plants, stones, and their true qualities:
For nought so vile that on the earth doth live
But to the earth some special good doth give,
Nor aught so good but strain'd from that fair use
Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse:
Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied;
And vice sometimes by action dignified.
Within the infant rind of this small flower
Poison hath residence and medicine power:
For this, being smelt, with that part cheers each part;
Being tasted, slays all senses with the heart.
Two such opposed kings encamp them still
In man as well as herbs, grace and rude will;
And where the worser is predominant,
Full soon the canker death eats up that plant.
And Giles, of course, asked me the burning question: “Why? Why is he speaking in rhyming couplets?”. There are lots of reasons why Shakespeare used rhyming verse. It sets up a playful relationship between Romeo and Friar. It’s also a way of putting across received information as it organises your thoughts as you speak into sections. It demands of you a kind of a rhythm; and not just a rhythm within yourself, but a rhythm between you and the other actor. Sometimes Romeo and I share lines, sometimes we share couplets, which makes it playful and light. It also displays that the Friar has got a wit. It’s a lovely scene
Rehearsal Bulletin 3
Getting the play on its feet
After having spent the first week doing table sessions and figuring out the language, we have now started standing up, starting to move and letting the play breathe and come to life. So we figure out where I enter from, where I exit, at what points I move and where I move to, if there’s any point I stand still, and so on. We try lots of different things. Yesterday, for example, I did the scene with Adetomiwa [Edun, playing Romeo] where Romeo comes to the Friar after he has been banished. I remember when I played Romeo as a young man, and it was my favourite scene then; Romeo gets a chance to be a spoilt brat (and really inside all of us, we want the opportunity to be spoilt brats), but the power of the words of the Friar bring him back from that heavy “ban-ish-éd”.
I’ve also noticed Dominic [Dromgoole, the director] gives very subtle notes, but that when I execute that note, it actually makes a huge difference. I was standing a certain way the other day during my first speech, and Dominic told me to change my posture; I’ve played quite a few older characters, so maybe I’ve got into the habit of standing a certain way, but when I did move differently, it made the whole speech much lighter and younger, which is what we are hoping ot achieve.
Movement
When Dominic has been working on scenes that I’m not in, I’ve been having some great classes with the experts at the Globe. One of those was a group session with Glynn [McDonald, the movement expert]. She talked about how there are four main archetypes of movement which characters tend to adopt: the king; the warrior; the magician; and the lover. Each has a different posture and type of movement associated with them, and that can bring out different characteristics. So the king, for example, represents authority and should be in control all the time, but he must always feel the weight of the crown pressing down on his head.
The Friar obviously isn’t a king, and he’s not a warrior or the lover – he’s a magician. However, when I started working with Glynn on the archetypal magician, his movement was all very, very quick and it felt very young. As I said before, I’m not thinking of the Friar as ancient, but I do think he’s closer to my age and so isn’t a young magician – this felt too energetic and a little chaotic. So I asked if it was possible for the magician to be older, and Glynn told me that all of these archetypes evolve and the magician evolves into a wizard. That’s as far as I am with that at the moment so I’m waiting to explore it further and share that journey with Glynn
Voice Work
The other class I am about to have at the end of the week is with the voice coach, Jan [Haydn Rowles]. I’ve not had much success with voice teachers in the past; it might be that I haven’t understood them and what they were doing, or maybe I didn’t put in the work. But I’ve worked with Jan before, when I was here for the International Fellowship, and I think she’s fantastic – we have a very fun relationship. And training your voice specifically for the Globe is so important; it’s such a different space from anywhere else, not only because you are outside and there are planes flying overhead, but it requires something else of you as an actor. I’ve got a pretty big voice anyway, so I’ve been told that I can get away with more than a lot of other people as I have quite a lot of natural support behind my voice, but I feel I’m at the level now where I want to do more than the basics. So we’ll see how that turns out on Friday!
Dancing: The Jig
Every show at the Globe has a jig at the end, and I think it’s such a grand idea; it’s based entirely in history and would have happened in Shakespeare’s day, and I think it’s a fantastic thing to do, particularly at the end of a tragedy. That might seem strange, but there are three dead bodies on the ground – Paris, Romeo and Juliet – so it’s a gloomy piece, a grim picture that is painted at the end of the play. And then there is silence for a moment before the jig. I think it is a wonderful way to say, “OK, that our play, the “two hours traffic of the stage”. It’s over, let’s have a dance!”
I love dancing and I love being physical, and I’ve done a lot of musical theatre as a younger actor, having big dancing roles in shows like Cabaret. But even when I was doing that, I didn’t learn things immediately as I’m not a natural dancer. And the rest of the company have had many more dance sessions because they’re all in the masked ball, whereas I haven’t really been doing any because obviously the Friar isn’t in that scene. So I feel I’m maybe struggling a little, but I’ll get there!
Rehearsal Bulletin 4
Learning Lines
We’re at a stage where we’ve done the table work, we’ve blocked stuff roughly and now we’re getting to the meat of the scene. I really enjoy that stage. So the books are down. It is always good to get rid of them and start opening out.
Some time last week, although Dominic [Dromgoole, director] was generally pleased, he was worried I was “a little bit book-bound.” He realised I was here by myself and so arranged for somebody to help me with learning lines. So for at least three of the last five days I’ve sat down with Lotte [Wakeman, text assistant] and basically she has gone through the lines with me and they’re getting stronger and stronger. It’s a wonderful support system; I’m feeling very positive being in this environment. Here at the Globe, there are support systems that I believe should be part of every production company. It’s amazing to have a director say: “You’re a little bit book-bound – do you want some help?” rather than see me struggle. I would have battled away and come through it, but I’m not stupid – if the help is there, I’ll take it! It is so much easier learning lines with someone saying lines back to you. So that has been a huge thing, I feel very well supported.
One of the best things that happened for the company was the big party on Saturday. Most of us got together on a social level. It’s really nice to feel that I’m part of a company that gets on well together. I think that comes right from the top; when you come into these buildings, you’re part of it. It’s just great.
Act 5 Scene 3: The Friar’s Last Speech
In a recent voice session with Jan [Haydn-Rowles, voice coach], we worked on the Friar’s long speech in the final scene. The speech involves me retelling almost everything that’s happened in the play:
• that Romeo was married to Juliet illegally by me on the day that Tybalt was killed by Romeo;
• that Juliet was crying for the banished Romeo, not Tybalt;
• that when her parents wanted to marry her to Paris, she came to me and had madness in her eyes, threatening to kill herself unless I came up with a plan;
• that I gave her these drugs and they made her look like she was dead, and she is buried alive in a tomb ;
• that in the meantime I sent a letter to tell Romeo, but the friar with my letter gets held up.
It’s a difficult speech, because even though everything I am saying is new to the other characters on stage, the audience has seen all this. So it can’t be a speech that just recounts – that would be pointless. There has to be some freshness.
Working on that scene with Jan yesterday, we had a break-through, which felt really good. She doesn’t work on advice or telling you what to do, but is very practical – things that actually have nothing to do with voice, but more to do with the text. She gives me exercises to work through and then she sits me down and says, “So how does that make you feel?” It is an intriguing way of working and it gives a sense of immediacy, which is great. For example, with the speech right at the end, she got me to work through moments when I can speak quite boldly and moments of delivering news to everyone onstage, already known to the audience. Dominic was very happy and gave some more stuff to add on to that work. He wants me to keep my focus in the speech within a quadrant – Capulet, Montague, the Prince and the lovers’ bodies. When I keep it within them, within that space, it helps it become immediate.
Movement
This week in a session with Glynn [MacDonald, movement] we used the Alexander technique, which is about focusing on the body and letting it do its natural movement and position. There is a lot going on in my life at the moment, but it wasn’t until I went to Glynn this morning that I let go. The session was just so freeing, particularly for my neck and back and to open me out.
Also, Glynn has a real empathy with the character of Friar Lawrence; she was talking about Easter week coming up and why the saints and the friars are painted with halos: because they bring the light. This is exactly what I’ve been working at for the Friar in his first scene (Act 2, Scene 2) I want him to bring with him that sense of light. So after using the Alexander technique and having that discussion, I was feeling about six inches taller, I felt lighter, I was breathing cleaner and deeper; it’s magic stuff. After talking with Glynn, I am planning to go to the Easter service at Southwark Cathedral, which is just along the river from the Globe. I have visited there before to see the tomb of the poet Gower, the character that I played in Pericles, so I have a link with that cathedral already.
More Research
I think actors and theatre-people are researchers by nature, and research has always been an incredibly important part of my process. So to have an on-site research team headed up by Dr Farah [Karim-Cooper, Globe Lecturer and Head of Courses & Research] is wonderful. For example, I came into the library and said I wanted to find out about herbs … and the books were there the next day!
I was also able to follow up an appointment with a herb-expert too. I went to the operating museum in London where they have herb gardens that would have been used in medicine, which was a huge help! I met this woman who was a herbal expert; I was at the stage of wanting to get some information about what it is that I give to Juliet, what this amazing drug is, and she was able to steer me towards suitable books. So I feel very happy about that.
I also wanted to know about the politics of the time, because the Capulets and the Montagues are at war, and war is politics. One of the research interns found an interesting article about the Prince and the Friar and the political roles that they play. I had an inkling that the Friar wants to deal with the politics of the play. All of this research gives you a firmer ground from which to operate, even if you’re not going to get that research across on stage. It’s great being in a place that has that capacity.
I also went to a lecture here with Adetomiwa [Edun, Romeo] and Ellie [Kendrick, Juliet] and it was fantastic. In the lecture, one of the things I learned was that the father figure would often be kissed in the morning by the son, either on the cheek or the hand to receive the blessing of the father-figure. Clearly in Romeo’s life I am far more of a father figure to him than Montague is. So I took this piece of information to the rehearsal and Dominic grabbed it straight away. We had a short discussion about whether it should be the hand, but Dominic thought the hand was too regal, so we’ve now got this lovely moment when Romeo comes in during my first scene, interrupts me and kisses me on the cheek. That decision was a direct result of attending that lecture, a reflection of the way that this whole place operates – everything feeds into everything else.