The enchanting words of Shakespeare, the beautiful music of Felix Mendelssohn, and the young, talented actors of the Starlight Theatre Company will come together to make some magic this month when the company presents “A Midsummer’s Night Dream” in several performances. With a wink to previous Starlight productions, there will be an added delight: a song by Gilbert and Sullivan.
Ginger Scarbrough Anderson, who began the summer youth theatre company in 2007, brought two of the stars of this year’s production to the KRWG studios to talk with Intermezzo host Leora Zeitlin: Sophia Diven and Isaac Morales, who perform the roles of Titania and Oberon, the queen and king of the fairies. Though both have been acting for a number of years, this is their first time performing Shakespeare.
“The more you learn about the show, the funnier it gets, and the more you want to keep learning about it,” Morales said, noting that he particularly enjoys creating suspense on the stage. For Diven, the pleasure lies in performing a strong character who is quite different from herself. “It’s an opportunity to become someone else,” she said. “[Titania’s] character comes off with so much power.” Anderson, who teaches and directs the students each summer, said that while both of these actors said they felt intimidated at first to perform Shakespeare, “they grabbed hold of those roles, even during auditions, and became those characters.”
Performances are at the Atkinson Recital Hall on the NMSU campus on Friday, July 20 and Saturday, July 21 at 7 p.m., with a Saturday matinee at 1 p.m., and on Friday, July 27 and Saturday, July 28 at 7 p.m., with a Friday children’s matinee at 10 a.m. Listen to the full interview to learn more about the play and production.
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