BYU Love's Labour's Lost

Saturday I attended BYU's performance of Love's Labour's Lost.

Before I attended this play I watched a Globe Theatre's performance so that I could contrast a traditional performance with BYU's adaptation. 

I really liked the ease and naturalness that these actors present while performing Shakespeare and helps the audience increase understanding with intonations and reactions. I found it much more enjoyable and comprehensible when I watched this performance than reading the play itself. 

BYU adapted this play to the era of WWII. 

In the director's note, Stephanie Breinholt explained that Love's Labour's Lost has always reminded her of her grandparent's story. So they used this play to represent the WWII era. They multiplied the parts and spread the lines around to lend importance to some more minor characters. I like the multiplication of parts because it showed how many people were in the same sort of situation and representational of the entire generation. At the end, when the girls tell them to wait before they get married the men leave for war. Don Armado ends up leaving with the 'King' and his associates after enlisting, leaving his radio show to his assistant. Every man in the play was enlisted in some part of the military. 

I think that BYU's adaptation was very creative and showed that Shakespeare can transcend time and generations. In my Shakespeare class, we often look for ways to relate Shakespeare to the current issues and BYU has done a great job showing how Shakespeare relates to this WWII era. 

They also creatively placed Don Armado as a radio host and added a LIVE jazz/swing band to create the 'bar' atmosphere... without the alcohol. The band was by far my favorite part just because I love band and it made me want to pick up my trumpet again. (Also it's always cool to watch a group together enough they don't need a director--this is typical of jazz bands). I felt like the band and music added to the play more than anything else. During the men's confessions of love the band played mimetic music (music that matches the scene) that characteristically matched each one of the men's personalities. Sometimes the music was soft and romantic and for another it was an upbeat swing that brought out a really fun side of the character. It was really cool to see how the band contributed-- and the parts they chose to stay silent. I am a huge music buff so I noticed how the trumpet used 3 different mutes/ tools to draw out a different tones throughout the play. I LOVE the big band's contribution and I don't think I would have liked it nearly as much without it.

 

The background of this video is the style of music. I don't think they got the band til the last minute because I can't find anything about them.