In the News

Shakespeare Gets His Due...

February 27th, 2015

They thundered, they raged, they pounded the floor and grabbed their garments. They dropped to their knees, flung their arms to the heavens and cursed their fate.

And they did it all with perfect diction.

Aspiring young thespians and orators from around the state, all of them high school students, came to tread the boards at the Cole Auditorium of Greenwich Library for the 31st annual Shakespeare Competition on Wednesday afternoon. It was the largest field of entrants yet.

Sponsored by the Greenwich branch of the English-Speaking Union, the competition is part of a national competition that gets 15,000 students from around the country to brush up on their Shakespeare. The local event was co-sponsored by Friends of the Greenwich Library and the Smith College Club of Greenwich and Stamford.

Twenty-three young players imbued Shakespeare's sonnets and monologues with their personal interpretations, each performer doing one of each.

Zoe Rose, a senior at the Classical Magnet School in Hartford, gave a sassy and coquettish reading of "Much Ado About Nothing." Greenwich High School senior Carly Polistina found the musicality in Shakespeare's verse and used her voice like an instrument, quavering during a section of "The Winter's Tale."

Michael Gulcicek, of Area Cooperative Educational Services' Educational Center for the Arts in New Haven, channeled Borscht Belt comedy in his rendering of a comic scene in "Two Gentlemen of Verona," standing on one foot and kissing his shoe.

Malcolm Joung of St. Luke's School in New Canaan recited Sonnet No. 127 with a spontaneity that made it appear as if the words had formed in his mind for the first time.

Andrew Israel, of Brunswick School in Greenwich, embodied a wrathful warrior and threatened to awaken the Bard himself when he shouted, "Cry `havoc' and let slip the dogs of war," a memorable line from "Julius Caesar."

Afterward, sipping lemonade, the young actors looked relieved and relaxed after their performances, pleased to be in the company of fellow dramatists.

"My hands were really sweaty. I felt shaky," said Rose, a senior. "But I felt good about it. It was the best I could bring."

Harrison Paek, a freshman from Amity Regional High School in Woodbridge, also confessed to the jitters.

"Getting up there, seeing the crowd, that was the first hurdle. But once I started talking, I was home free," he said. "And finding people with the same interests as me is great."

Polistina, a GHS senior and second-place finisher at the competition, said it was a pleasure to perform in an event that attracts so many talented young actors.

"It's amazing to be here, I've wanted to do this since I was a freshman," she said.

"The memorization wasn't hard. It was finding the emotion behind it," she said.

A professional actor who helped judge the contest, Stephen Bogardus, a Greenwich native, saluted the young Shakespeareans.

"To make the commitment, to learn it, to imbue it with the emotion, it's a real testament," he said. He was joined in the judging with Mark Lamos and Susanna Frazer, theater directors.

An organizer from the English-Speaking Union, Anne Hall Elser, of Greenwich beamed after the show.

"The strength of the acting was very impressive. There's a lot of camaraderie. It's a good feeling. And who knew Shakespeare could be such fun?" she asked.

The final winner of the competition is awarded a trip to study Shakespeare in England over the summer.

Greenwich Time