Heartwood Regional Theater Artistic Director Griff Braley continually works to offer an audience a memorable theatrical experience they can seldom get anywhere locally.
Right now, Braley is in the production phase of the upcoming Heartwood offering by William Shakespeare, “Macbeth.”
While students were on winter break, Braley is at the Parker Poe Theater on the campus of Lincoln Academy, working with videographer Cole Christine before a green screen, videotaping a dramatic scene on a modern field of battle.
Braley’s “Macbeth” is powerfully set before the backdrop of today, incorporating as well all the technology currently at the fingertips of modern military leaders and soldiers.
On Feb. 22, the Heartwood crew plans to videotape the opening scene from Act I, Scene 2, where the characters Duncan, Malcolm, Donalbain and Lennox receive a battle report from the Fortes Camp, courtesy of a bloodied and battle-weary sergeant played by South Portland actor Tony Reilly.
Instead of relaying a battle scene report to his leaders in person, in Heartwood’s production, the sergeant is transmitting his report via cellphone to a war room wherein Duncan, Malcolm and others receive the message.
Shooting Reilly’s scene before a green screen allows Braley and Christine to insert, via computer-generated-images, a stunning background.
According to website vimeo.com, on their page for video school lessons, “green screens can transport a subject anywhere, limited only by the imagination.”
With the appropriate software, directors like Braley create dynamic special effects that take well-heeled Shakespearean tragedies like “Macbeth” and inject new life with modern immediacy and drama.
Heartwood Executive Director Joy Braley doesn’t recall Heartwood using a green screen in the past, but said Griff has used one for his Lincoln Academy students.
“I know we used projection for ‘Sunday in the Park with George’, but I don’t recall Griff ever using a green screen for Heartwood,” Joy Braley said. “I think he’s used them for his classes, when they were working with video.”
In a tip of the hat to ingenuity and being tight with a buck, Griff Braley fashioned the green screen in-house, using muslin stretched over old flats.
Joy Braley said using the modern green screen technology for an important scene allows actors like Tony Reilly to virtually be in two places at once. “I believe he’s in another production at this time,” she said.
In fact, that’s true; Reilly will next appear with AIRE, the American Irish Repertory Ensemble in “A Couple of Blaguards,” by the brothers Frank and Malachy McCourt, in the Studio Theater at Portland Stage in March and April.
Rehearsals for Heartwood’s “Macbeth” are scheduled to start soon, and more state-of-the-art production bells and whistles are planned.
Heartwood Regional Theater Company’s “Macbeth” include evening performances on April 26, 27 and May 3, 4, 9-11 at 7:30 p.m. and one Sunday, May 5 matinee at 3 p.m.
For more information, call the box office at 563-1373, email: boxoffice@heartwoodtheater.org, or visit their website, www.heartwoodtheater.org.
“Macbeth” sponsors are Newcastle Square Realty & Cheney Insurance. Season sponsor is Bath Saving Institution.
