Summary: For the very first time, Judi opens up about every Shakespearean role she has played throughout her seven-decade career, from Lady Macbeth and Titania to Ophelia and Cleopatra. In a series of intimate conversations with actor & director Brendan O'Hea, she guides us through Shakespeare's plays with incisive clarity, revealing the secrets of her rehearsal process and inviting us to share in her triumphs, disasters, and backstage shenanigans.
MY THOUGHTS:
I requested this library book for the trip down memory lane, as I studied a fair bit of Shakespeare throughout High School and Uni English for my undergraduate degree, then read a bit more in recent years as part of my Graduate Diploma in Creative Writing. Plus, I'm an admirer of Dame Judi Dench, especially for her starring role in As Time Goes By.
The book is a fascinating compilation of Brendan O'Hea's discussions with Dame Judi about every Shakespearean role she has ever played. Since we're talking about an actor with a phenomenal memory who has been at the top of her game for nearly seven decades and is now in her nineties, Dench has plenty to draw from. The interviews themselves took four years to compile, so they're worth savoring slowly, which is just what I did.
The pair of them reminisce about the unfolding plots, the characters and their motivations, stagecraft, films, other actors, the energy they derive from the audience, and noteworthy incidents. They address interesting topics such the onus she feels upon herself to live up to what the general public believe about historical characters. Or the fact that most of Shakespeare's comedies tend to start off with displacement and strife while his tragedies, ironically open with celebration and optimism. Nothing is too sacrosanct to be mentioned. And if Dame Judi decides that Brendan is talking a load of codswallop, she'll tell him so. It's often very funny.
As for the book's title, Shakespeare was the man who paid her rent because Dench and her husband, Michael Williams, lived in Stratford-upon-Avon throughout the 1970s where they made their living as Shakespearean actors.
Here is one of many remarks that tickled my fancy.
'When I was in Macbeth, I said to Ian McKellan, "I know who I'm doing it for tonight. I'm going to pretend that God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost have bought three seats in the stalls." And Ian said, "Yes, that's fine, Jude, but they'll only need one ticket."'
Dench's first role was Ophelia, straight out of drama school, and although she had a ton of rough reviews for it, her ball kept rolling. I love that when she outgrew the roles of younger heroines, she aced the senior women. Dench played Daniel Day-Lewis's mother, Gertrude, when he was Hamlet. She played Benedict Cumberbatch's mother, Cecily the Duchess of York, when he was Richard III. She played both mother and daughter, Hermione and Perdita, in the same production of The Winter's Tale, because they were in different time frames. She played Queen Katherine opposite both Robert Hardy's and Donald Houston's Henry V when the two productions ran simultaneously. In 2010, she played an elderly version of Titania the fairy queen based on the vibe of Queen Elizabeth I.
This book reminds me why I fell foul of Shakespeare though. As a young student, I found his trademarks getting old. All those plot-device driven shipwrecks, the corny identity mix-ups, and any number of girls disguising themselves as guys without anyone ever once twigging. Come on! Worst of all, I hated the pathologically jealous jerks (usually rulers) whose hissy fits had the power to thoroughly decimate the lives of others.
Yet somehow, despite all that, Dame Judi inspires me to give the Bard another try. After all, we unwittingly quote many words which he coined. As a writer, if he couldn't find a word he was looking for, this genius would simply make one up, which he did over 1700 times. She calls his body of work, 'an international language, a beacon for humanity, and a bridge across cultures.' She reminds me that his clowns and jesters, who are old souls with sixth sense, are well worth reading for their insightful lines. She goes so far as to claim that the lines Shakespeare wrote are so good for her brain that she gets endorphin rushes.
Wow, along with reading more Shakespeare inspired material, I may even, heaven forbid, crack open a play or two after all this time.
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