A Look Inside Shakespeare's Imagination

To Live, To Love, To Be

Company 5

Sherman Cymru, Theatre 2

17^th April 2013

Being in the audience of To Live, To Love, To Be was like being  a witness to some occult religious ceremony; the atmosphere was heavy with expectation and a sinister sense of danger never left the room. Sitting on the balcony looking down at the huge revolving table as incense filled the room was the beginning of our initiation to the mystical world of Shakespeare’s mind.

Around the table various figures from Shakespeare’s past and fantastical imagination debate the source of the Bard’s genius. His school teacher believes that education is the key, a travelling player says that they inspired Shakespeare as a young man, Ariel from The Tempest argues that he has the heart of a fairy and Macbeth claims that the famous poet adapted stories from history to suit his own means.  

For a community group to be able to perform a specially commissioned script, with such high production values is incredible. Every element of the design was better than some professional companies. The lighting design by Ceri James was breathtaking; it had the power the change the space from the dark passages of Macbeth’s castle to the sunny Stratford of Shakespeare’s youth, whilst always maintaining a sense of the supernatural. 

An investigation into Shakespeare’s past and motivation is always going to be very intellectual and the wordplay was at times beautiful but the atmosphere was so engulfing and mysterious that some of the very down to earth humour was lost among the incense and grandeur. This lack of humour made the production, although visually impressive, very dry and academic at points. 

Considering that this is such a challenging text and the company run an open door policy, whereby anyone can get involved with no auditions, the standard of acting was very, very high. Some of the younger members are also involved with the Sherman’s Youth Theatre and they are undoubtedly getting an excellent introduction to the world of theatre. Certain performances showed real professional potential – Eifion Ap Cadno (Shakespeare), Andreas Constantinou (Macbeth) and Giorgia Marchetta (Lady Macbeth) to name a few.  Among all this talent the stand out performance of the event came from the highly talented Nerys Jones as William Shakespeare’s Welsh grandmother who argues passionately (and convincingly) that his talent comes from his Celtic blood. 

A really interesting production that is an absolute master class in building tension and atmosphere. It will be fascinating to see where the company goes from here, they have set themselves a very high standard to maintain.