Carpenter, Craig Marker, and Liam Vincent in Romeo and Juliet (2009); photo by Kevin Berne.

In the months leading up to our 2011 Main Stage season, we’ll be profiling the creative minds behind the season’s productions—Titus Andronicus, The Verona Project, Candida, and The Taming of the Shrew—in our e-newsletters. For this season’s inaugural installment, we’re featuring actor, longtime Cal Shakes Associate Artist, and occasional blogger James Carpenter who will play the titular role in Joel Sass’ production of Titus Andronicus. What follows is the full transcript of Cal Shakes’ November email interview with Jim. To sign up for our email newsletter, click here.

In the next few months, you’ll be playing a wide variety of roles: your fifth turn as Scrooge in A Christmas Carol at A.C.T.; the title character in The Dresser at San Jose Rep; and Titus in Cal Shakes’ first-ever production of Titus Andronicus. When approaching such disparate roles, do you look for commonalities between the characters? Or are you more intrigued by the differences between the roles?

I think I’m more intrigued by the differences in the roles and don’t really look for

the commonalities; if I see one I mark it and make sure I’m not making the same choice for the role I’m working on currently. Right now I’m “leapfrogging” projects—learning lines for The Dresser on BART while rehearsing and performing Christmas Carol, reading through 3 Sisters which I’ll be performing at BRT while rehearsing for Titus, and then trying to find time to read and get acquainted with Titus itself.

Can you share any additional early thoughts on preparing for Titus?

Titus seems a man who has lived “by the book” most of his life—he has a sense of order of the way life should be lead, both militarily and at home; when this sense of order is displaced by chaos, by injustice, by random brutality rather than that measured brutality in which his military self resides, he finds himself emotionally at sea with no stars to guide him. That’s about it for now on that front, sadly—hopefully I’ll wax a bit more productive on these issues.

Do you have a favorite role (or a few favorite roles) you’ve played here at Cal Shakes? What, when, and why?

“Richard II in the mid-’90s (1994, directed by Penny Metropulos) would have to be at

the top of my list; a beautiful play, and one I had nearly a year to work on, much time to decipher a tricky role. I was three quarters of the way memorized when we started rehearsals and knew the way he walked, moved, and talked—I think it energized the rest of the cast to some degree and everyone was 100% on board, everyone looked for interesting choices. (It was) a beautiful piece for actors and our cast was splendid—L. Peter Callender as Bolingbroke, Domenique Lozano as Lady Gaunt (Duchess of York, actually. —ed., dusty from the Cal Shakes archive loft) I think, were both brilliant and I remember the closing night specifically because Peter asked if I’d be godfather to his child-to-be.

James Carpenter and Susannah Schulman in Nicholas Nickleby; photo by Kevin Berne.

We both proved ourselves to be sentimental old duffs by weeping copiously. You should check out the review the Chron wrote some time—a three-inch high caption on the review.

Another would have to be Much Ado that I did the next year, I believe; Domenique L. was Beatrice to my Benedick—both of these were directed by Penny Metropulos, and we had a splendid cast for this one as well.

During Jon’s tenure I’d have to say that Nicholas Nickleby (2005) would have been at the top—a wonderful story told with love and joy, a fantastic cast and Jon’s beautiful direction. It was an amazing experience.

I loved doing Gloucester in Lear (2007, directed by Lisa Peterson)—I have wanted to play that cliff scene ever since I first saw it on PBS; and I enjoyed my bit in Richard III (2007, directed by Mark Rucker) and loved watching Reg Rogers’ splendid performance. I’d have to say my newest favorite would be Macbeth, mostly because of Joel Sass. He had such an acute vision for the show, allowed his actors so much input and is just such a delightful man in general that it made the experience exciting, made us challenge ourselves and push the envelope. I’m expecting more of the same in Titus!

What’s the first piece of theater you ever saw? Alternately (or in addition), what was the first piece you saw that really made you think, “I want to be a part of this”?

Good question …what was it? I remember my sister doing Who Stole Granny’s Garters or some such play at her junior high—I loved it. What made me want to be a part of it? I’ll give you an extensive quote from my blog—an old story of how Jim started. Ready?

I was 17 and a junior in high school and got a role in the school play, Father Goose, playing the strange, wacky, sex-crazed 17-year-old. Typecast first thing off the bat. Thankfully, the only thing I can remember of my performance is that first, fateful opening night…

The first time I appeared was from stage left with jacket on; I was to run in, cross to the other actor at stage right, and deliver my line to him, peel my jacket off as I went, and toss it back over my shoulder without looking, in the general direction of the coat tree standing near the door I’d just entered. I did so. I got about half of my line out before the audience came unglued. Howling. I was facing right; my friend who was facing me was looking stage left over my shoulder with his eyes wide…?????????… The audience wouldn’t stop laughing.

Pulled by an irresistible tug of curiosity, I turned slowly around, the audience’s anticipation of my eventual reaction making the laughter increase the farther I turned. My eyes fell on the coat tree and there, on one of the hooks, hung my jacket. By the collar. My jaw dropped. The audience laughed more. But I didn’t ignore this and continue with the scene—I walked to the coat tree, turned up the edge of the jacket and saw I’d unwittingly performed a minor miracle; the jacket had landed so that the loop on the inside of the garment’s neck had slid neatly over the hook. My jaw dropped again. I showed the audience. They screamed … I’d by now abandoned all pretense of being in character and looked straight out at the kids I’d incited to near-riot, and who were by now red in the face and pounding the tables, and just laughed right back at them. And even though I knew I was being an utter fool, I didn’t care; it was elating—thrilling somehow.

THAT was the moment I knew I wanted to be an actor.

Who are your all-time favorite actors?

Michael Caine, Anthony Hopkins.

You were named of one 2010’s Lunt-Fontanne Fellows, and took part in a week-long master class last summer at Ten Chimneys Foundation. What are some of the lessons you learned during that experience that continue to inform your work?

I learned that there are depths to Shakespeare’s work that I may never rise to; that his words, his work and his thoughts are so modern, still so current that it takes my breath away at times. I learned some small smattering of new techniques, new ways of looking at the material—I can’t say how much it will affect my future work, but the experience itself was so productive and inspiring that I will carry it with me always.

And finally, if you could have appeared any play in history, what (and/or where, and/or with whom) would it be?

I have no idea. I kind of like where I am right now.

Subscribe now to get the best seats at the best prices for Titus Andronicus and the rest of our 2011 season.

You’re probably familiar with the dire statistics on California’s funding for arts education: The 2009 state budget cut funding for K–12 students by $2.5 million, or $400 per student; a 2007 study by SRI International showed that 96% of California middle schools and 72% of high schools fail to offer standards-aligned courses of study in all four arts disciplines*, thus failing to meet state education goals.

What you may not be familiar with is the many ways that Cal Shakes addresses the gaps left by the government, including Summer Shakespeare Conservatories, Student Discovery Matinees, after-school programs, and classroom residencies. This time of year, our teaching artists are busy partnering with classroom teachers all over the Bay Area to bring the arts and the classics to a wide variety of fall residencies.

At EC Reems Academy in East Oakland, Teaching Artists Emily Morrison and Marissa Wolf are working with four classroom teachers to study Much Ado About Nothing. Last year’s residency took place in two eighth-grade classrooms; this fall sees an expansion to two seventh-grade classes, bringing the total number of EC Reems residency students to 74. Each grade is studying a different group of scenes— including the big dance scene, for which the older kids are choosing the music. “Marissa and I collaborated from the start,” says Emily, also Cal Shakes’ Artistic Learning Programs Manager, “selecting a variety of scenes for each grade level to work on.  Now that we are putting the groups back together for the culminating showcase, the kids get a greater sense of the play as a whole.”

Also studying Much Ado are the four fifth-grade classes at Fruitvale Elementary, where Teaching Artist Laura Lowry worked so well with fourth-grade teacher Maureen Whelan last year that Whelan advocated successfully to include her younger class again this time around; and all five seventh-grade classes at Charlotte Wood Middle School in Danville, where Cal Shakes Associate Artist Clive Worsley is continuing his five-year partnership with teachers Linda Roshay and Kathleen McCabe.

Another longstanding residency relationship is that of Teaching Artist Norman Gee and Oakland High School teacher Mike Jones, who are partnering for the fifth time this year. Jones’ two ninth-grade classes are studying Romeo and Juliet this fall. In addition, Cal Shakes is expanding its activities to include the Environmental Science Academy (ESA), a smaller learning community within Oakland High, whose high-achieving students follow a common academic program emphasizing academics and careers in environmental science. A Cal Shakes teaching artist, working with ESA’s cofounder Katherine Noonan, will guide the school’s tenth-grade English and History students through curriculum based on Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, focusing on literary merits, California history, and love of the land.

At Oakland Technical High School—our newest residency partner, born out of Jessa Brie Berkner’s Advanced Drama students’ international success with Hamlet: Blood in the Brain—a Cal Shakes teaching artist will partner with Berkner’s ninth-grade English/Drama class to investigate Walter Dean Myers’ young adult novel Fallen Angels. The students will use dramatization as one way to explore the book’s themes of war, human rights, and race relations.
Five schools.

16 classrooms in all. Just one way in which Cal Shakes invests in the next generation of Californians by providing in-depth, far-reaching creative educational opportunities.
* Visual arts, music, dance, and theater.

You may have read her name before, in a past newsletter or on our blog. You may have seen her picture on Cal Shakes conservatory brochures, postcards, or posters. If you’ve been to our theater, you’ve most likely been greeted by her mother, longtime House Manager Claire Stoermer. And if you were at the Bruns on the opening day of  the 2010 season, you may have seen 14-year-old Zendaya Coleman helping to sweep the new plaza!

Now the rest of the world is about to be introduced to this talented former Cal Shakes conservatory student. On Sunday, November 7, she made her television debut in Shake It Up!, the Disney Channel’s latest foray into the buddy-comedy genre. Shake it Up!—created by Chris Thompson of Laverne & Shirley and Bosom Buddies fame—stars Zendaya and Bella Thorne (Big Love, My Own Worst Enemy, Dirty Sexy Money) as two best friends who become background dancers on a Chicago TV show.

Congratulations to Zendaya and her parents; we’re incredibly proud to have them in our Cal Shakes family.

More info:

The Disney Channel’s Shake It Up! website.

An interview with Zendaya in Diablo magazine.

Zendaya gives a shout-out to Cal Shakes in Variety.

Pictured: Zendaya Coleman; photo courtesy of JE Talent.

In keeping with fall tradition, our final show of the 2010 season, Much Ado About Nothing, had five very special a.m. performances: our Student Discovery matinees. This year more than 2,500 students, teachers, and chaperones from 44 Bay Area schools got to see Jonathan Moscone’s joyful production. Thanks to funding from the NEA’s Shakespeare for a New Generation, more than 50% of these student tickets were underwritten, and many of the students attending had never seen a Shakespeare play or any live theater at all. Here at Cal Shakes, we know that participation in art is not a luxury, but rather a necessity to becoming a thoughtful, tolerant, and joyfully well-rounded human being; enthusiastic reactions to this year’s Student Matinee series proved it to us yet again.

In his spirited pre-show welcome and synopsis, Associate Artist Clive Worsley asked the students: “Do you ever see two people who don’t really like each other, are always picking on each other, can’t stand to see one another … but are always hanging out together?” A rumble of agreement welled up from the young crowds, and we knew they were hooked into the romance about to unfold.

Student reactions are sometimes louder and often broader than the evening audiences. They delighted in Dogberry calling himself “an ass”, laughed loudly as water was poured over Beatrice’s eavesdropping head, and let out big sighs of happiness during the final marriage scene. After each performance is a 15- minute Q&A, with many of the actors returning to the stage to engage in a direct dialogue with students. “Do you really kiss and do you like it?” was a commonly posed question. The actors always replied thoughtfully, explaining that performing with someone—whether in an embrace or a fight—takes a great deal of trust and respect. “What happens when you forget a line?” one student inquired. “Well,” Danny Scheie quickly retorted, “you do Fakespeare!” When a young girl asked where the actors were from, Catherine Castellanos stood up and proudly stated “Stockton!,” eliciting huge applause, as, on that particular day, more than 250 kids had come from Stockton Unified Early College Academy.

“I thought it was going to be boring,” summarized one student, “but it was really fun.”

Teachers were pleased with the event as well. “Once again,” wrote Barbara Cohen of St. Anthony’s School in Oakland, ”thanks for making this possible for children who are now so proud that they’ve seen a ‘real’ play and that, even though their English isn’t perfect yet, they understood what the author was saying.”

Pictured: Beatrice (Domenique Lozano) hides out among a Much Ado Student Matinee audience; photo by Jay Yamada.

Cal Shakes’ 2010 raffle-ticket sales will end in mid-October. And if you haven’t already bought your tickets by then, that will also be the end of your opportunity to win our amazing Grand Prize: a seven-night stay in Casa Alegría—House of Happiness—in Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica.

Casa Alegría is a beautifully appointed, 3,600-square-foot private villa with four bedrooms and four and one-half baths spread over three air-conditioned levels, all overlooking a pristine ocean beach on the edge of the impossibly lush Manuel Antonio National Park. The house features:

What’s more, this Grand Prize includes coach airfare for two to Costa Rica. If that isn’t enough to make you want to purchase 20 raffle tickets, maybe this will put you over the edge: From now through the end of the season, use code word ALEGRĺA and we’ll throw in two free tickets for every 20 you purchase!

Other prizes in this year’s raffle include a set of four subscriptions to Cal Shakes’ 2011 season; and twelve monthly deliveries of Peet’s fine coffee or tea.

Raffle tickets are one for $10, three for $20, and 20 for $100 (or 22 for $100 with the code word!), and all proceeds support Cal Shakes’ programming. So the next time you’re at the Bruns, pick up tickets from a friendly roving raffle-seller; or stop by or call our administrative offices (701 Heinz Ave., Berkeley). To purchase tickets by phone, dial Ian Larue at 510.548.3422 x107.

The raffle drawing will be held in late October; winners will be notified by phone. We can’t wait to call and tell you what you’ve won!

For more information on—and photos of—Casa Alegria, please click here.