M E E T: A N D Y E D E L M A N
What is your favorite part about the process?
My favorite part of the process has been learning how to work with the actors. As a theater student, I personally hadn't really had much experience on the other side of the table...As a director, understanding how to communicate your vision to the people that are physicalizing the text onstage and making sure that the notes that you're giving are understandable and specific has been really interesting and really eye-opening.
What is it like putting on theatre in COVID times?
Being the movement coach in addition to being assistant director, it's been interesting because the actors can't physically touch each other. So, figuring out how to stage a scene that would typically involve quite a lot of physical contact has been a challenge, but what we've found is different ways to use the text to translate messages that would normally be translated physically. It's put more of an emphasis on the words and on each individual actor's work rather than the physical interaction.
Do you find yourself having to adapt your vision as you undergo rehearsal?
I definitely did have to learn what the company was capable of and what worked with the space. Also, adapting to Professor Shively’s vision and trying to make sure that we're on the same page...I definitely go in each day with an idea of what we're going to do, but honestly, a big part of the job has just been an exercise in collaboration with other artists and adapting to their capabilities and their needs.
What was your attitude toward Shakespeare before the production? Has the production changed this?
My rehearsal process really just started with the research [with Professor Shively]. I'm called every night, so I'm there for the entire duration of the rehearsal process. I get to see how [Professor Shively] works with all the different groups within the show. I've been working with the witches more, but I have gotten to work with the company as a whole, and it's been really wonderful to sort of experiment with a smaller group and then bring what I've learned through working with them into my work with the whole cast. Rather than learning a specific part or just a sub-section of a show, I've had to learn the whole show and learn every actor or every character’s perspective and understand where each character is coming into the story.
What was your experience as AD? How was your rehearsal process different compared to others’?
I love Shakespeare. The wonderful thing about Shakespeare is that it can be interpreted in literally any way that you want it to...the flexibility that it just sort of inherently comes with and the opportunities then to create something really interesting and unique [is something I’ve] always really appreciated. As an actor, I've always enjoyed work that is a huge departure from my reality in 2021….I've always enjoyed Shakespeare or any sort of classical theater that takes place in a different time period, because I think it really allows you to dive into it and stretch yourself as a performer.
What should the audience pay attention to?
I've been working very closely with the three witches, and in our production, they're almost narrating the show. A huge part of our job has been trying to frame the show through the witches eyes. We've put them into scenes where they wouldn't normally be onstage and we’ve sort of edited the show so that it’s as if the plot of the play is a plan constructed by witches…. I will say our interpretation of Butoh is exactly that: our interpretation….We've just taken bits and pieces and implemented it into Macbeth in a way that it serves our purposes for the show. Through my research I've learned that Butoh isn't a specific technique, it's more of an aesthetic or a style. So we've really tried to honor that. I think it helps that it's very open-ended and very open to artistic interpretation, unlike [other] forms of dance.