Star-crossed lovers, up close and personal: Lowcountry Shakespeare provides immersive 'Romeo and Juliet'

 'These characters are real people. I thought, gosh, wouldn't it be brilliant if we could just come up with a way that we could flesh out the lives of all those other rich, beautiful characters in a more intense way?'

IN AN entirely unique live theatre experience, Lowcountry Shakespeare premieres their immersive retelling of Romeo and Juliet from November 14-23.

Immersive theatre essentially breaks the "fourth wall," and allows audience members to be another character in the show, having freedom to roam as they want.

This freedom for the audience also means a heightened level of discipline and creativity for the actors.

We spoke with director Kristi Artinian to learn more about how their creative way of performing a play came about. 

“We had a thing we wanted to do, and it wasn't getting done the way we wanted to do it. So that's what started us doing that style of theater," Artinian says.

Established in 2012, Lowcountry Shakespeare was inspired by a London theater called Punchdrunk – specifically, a performance of The Masque of the Red Death, based on Edgar Allen Poe's collection of stories. The program took place at the Battersea Arts Centre, and the entire space was transformed for each story featured.

The audience was given masks and was able to explore the entire space at their will. Since Punchdrunk shows are almost nonverbal, there was a lot of dancing and movement. 

"I love Punchdrunk shows, but I'd love to see that sort of immersion into the world of Shakespeare. For me, the plays are so rich and full of life. These characters are real people. I thought, gosh, wouldn't it be brilliant if we could just come up with a way that we could flush out the lives of all those other rich, beautiful characters in a more intense way? So that's what made us start producing this kind of work,” she says. 

Before Artinian chooses a play, she first finds a performance space, and the space tells them what they can perform. She says that they look for spaces that will allow them a month to transform the space, perform, and put it back how it was.

Artinian says that she knew she wanted to do Romeo and Juliet because it’s a play most people are familiar with. The play has a lot of elements, and it’s a great fit for immersive theater, Artinian noted.

There will be students and faculty from Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) and Georgia Southern University. With the younger students involved, Artinian hopes that they will want to stay in Savannah and continue being involved with the performing arts. 

If she is directing a play in a more traditional manner, Artinian says she does table work. This method is where the actors sit down at a table with their script and read their lines. She then asks them questions about their lines to ensure clarity. 

“I am dogmatic about table work, because my big belief is whatever kind of Shakespeare you're doing – whether it's immersive or traditional or whatever – the actors need to be a thousand percent clear about what they're saying. If they're not clear about what they're saying, how can we possibly expect an audience to be clear about what they're saying?" Artinian says.

"And so often when I've seen not awesome Shakespeare, to say it that way, it's clear to me that the cast has sort of a general sense of what they're saying and then the audience is left confused. I know these plays pretty well, and I've sat in productions and gone, what are they talking about?” Artinian says. 

To balance historical accuracy and modern immersion techniques, Artinian says that she sets her shows in a particular era. For example, she’s setting this play in the mid-19th century. She considered playing an opera record because opera was popular in Italy. However, she realized that there were no records in 1820. While the space they have for Romeo and Juliet is modern, the audience will have to have the suspension of disbelief. 

“You can see we've got out there those two sorts of structures. We've got the Capulet's house on the one side. We've got the Montague's house on the other side. But as you can see, we didn't build them up entirely," she says.

"There are walls to suggest walls. We're doing that for a practical reason because that way if people are standing outside, they can still look in and see the action that's going on. But we're not going for exact accuracy and perfection. It serves a purpose. People can see, even if we had the money to do it, it's about people being able to see in there,” she said. 

The actors and actresses will wear costumes that are as closely related to the era as possible. Artinian says that there will be zippers on ensembles, but it won’t be noticeable enough to get a viewer thinking about historical accuracy.

As for sets, she says that she goes with suggestions. There is one room that will be split into a royal court outside of the Prince’s house. 

"They get to walk around in it, they'll get to go up to this, they'll get to feel the water with their hands. It's engaging every sense in a way that a traditional play often does not. Sometimes there's taste, there'll be scents, you'll walk into 'em and it'll smell a certain way. It is something that you so often don't get when you're watching a more traditional play,” Artinian says. 

She says the actors spend a lot of time in rehearsal given the particular demands of immersive theatre proximity. It can especially be tough for new actors to adjust to the proximity to the audience.

Artinian states that the actors have to trust her word. She went further by saying that the main thing is the actors’ path or track. Track refers to what the actor does from the moment before the audience walks in until the moment they are out. 

“All the in-character stuff they do, that part is what we make into a well-oiled machine. There's nothing to wonder about in that part. They know where they have to be, and they know what they're doing. They know exactly how they're filling all that space," she says.

"It's all very deliberate. It's all very intentional. So that’s when you add the audience in, the X factor, the unknown factor. The cast has some tools, again, things we've prepared for. Then each immersive piece that we do, we always have the question of who is the audience in this world. We know who the actors are. You're living out your lives as your characters, so who are these people who are now just standing around and watching you do your thing? And in every immersive show that I've directed or done with this company, it's always a little different. We always have different answers to who is the audience,” she says. 

Artinian wants the audience to walk away with an experience that they were able to be a part of. She wants audiences to take away the feeling that they got to know the characters in a way that traditional text wouldn’t allow.  

Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet from Lowcountry Shakespeare
November 14, 15, 16, 21, 22, and 23 at the Vintage Special Event Center, located at 980 Industry Drive in Savannah.
Tickets are $35 for general admission and $25 for military veterans,
students, and senior citizens.