SC Shakespeare’s Upstart Crows

Today is our tireless teacher and leader Katie Mixon’s birthday! After all her hard work creating theatre this year, she deserves to be celebrated. ❤️

Yesterday was so, so much fun!! Thank you, everyone, for coming out. 💚 We love our students and our community! Happy Juneteenth!

Why is King Alonso so angry with Sebastian? Swing by our performance with NiA on Saturday to find out!! Bring a chair, a water bottle, and your lovely face ☺️ Can’t wait to see you!

: Two students performing a scene in which one character, wearing a crown, is angrily motioning to another character, seated and wearing a tiara, to be quiet.

Friends!! Our performance with NiA is a WEEK AWAY!! Our students are working hard at rehearsals, and we can’t wait to see you on the morning of the show. This is a high energy performance designed for families, so if you have little ones or know someone who does, we hope to see you at 1013 Duke Avenue at 10 AM Saturday! Of course, adults can enjoy it too 😉 Stay tuned for updates! We’re doing Act I, Scene I from The Tempest. Drop a ⛈ in the comments if you’re excited!!

: A group of students, wearing masks, crowns and pirate hats, stand in a field. Two students hold a rope and one is seated in front of it. The director is holding a script and pointing, telling students where to stand.

Exciting news!! The Upstart Crows are going to be performing in the NiA Company’s HOLLA on June 19th!! More details to come. Trust us, you won’t want to miss this one. In the meantime, our friends at NiA need some assistance to get this performance on its feet. Help us out by donating to the GoFundMe so we can put on the comeback show of a lifetime for our community - they’re so close to their goal, and every dollar helps! 🤎🤎🤎 https://gofund.me/bdee5b02 Darion McCloud Storyteller

Would Shakespeare celebrate International Women’s Day? Heck yes, he would! Shakespeare was surrounded by women; The Queen of England Elizabeth I, his wife Anne, his two daughters Judith and Susanna, whoever the Dark Lady of his sonnets was (check out Emilia The Play if you want to learn an amazing story); and he notably creates full, reasoning, expressive women characters with souls. A woman with her own soul was a rare occurrence in the other plays written in his time.
The Upstart Crows invite you to look deeper into some of Shakespeare’s female characters to discover powerful women we can all admire. Brave Imogen in Cymbeline, powerful and lasting Queen Margaret in the History Plays, direct and passionate Constance in King John, determined Lady MacBeth in MacBeth, vociferous Paulina from The Winter’s Tale, and steadfast and persistent Emilia from Othello.
We want to thank the upstanding women who support the Upstart Crows. We would not exist without these FEMALE POWERHOUSES! Thank you most of all to Linda Khoury--who created The South Carolina Shakespeare Company, and has kept it running for 30 years! Thanks to: Michelle, Shannon, Jessica, Carrollee, Omme, Carolina, Lee Jane, Lynn, Miriam, Kathy, Karen, and all the other rocking women who support us!
Happy International Women’s Day!
--Katie and Lena

[ : a painting of the character Imogen from Cymbeline.]

Our interview with Darion McCloud is up now, only on our Substack page! In the final installment of our Black History Month series, our student Daviyon Alston spoke to the actor, director, educator, local hero, and much else about his career and love for Shakespeare.
When asked what advice he has for young actors, McCloud answered: “Just know that you’re going to have to find your opportunities. Don’t wait for them to come to you; go create them.” Read the full conversation: https://upstartcrows.substack.com/p/interview-with-darion-mccloud?r=f72uf&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email&utm_source=copy

Our interview with Devon Glover, a.k.a. The Sonnet Man, is up now, exclusively on our Substack page! As part of our Black History Month series, our student Terence Wright sat down with the educator, actor and musician to ask him a few questions about his life and career.
When asked what advice he has for young actors, The Sonnet Man responded, “It doesn’t happen overnight. Keep your goals in your pocket; be dedicated to your art.” Read the full interview at the link: https://upstartcrows.substack.com/p/interview-with-devon-glover-aka-the?r=f72uf&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email&utm_source=copy

Keith Hamilton Cobb starts off his play, American Moor, by describing the scene in an audition room to his audience: “First up, a little white man is asking me if I have any questions about playing a large black man.” He replies to the white director, “No...I ain't got no questions. But you should.”
Hamilton Cobb is a writer and actor who you have probably seen on stage or on screen. Most people will recognize him from years on All My Children or CSI: Miami. Hamilton Cobb trained at NYC’s Tish School of the Arts and he has performed some of William Shakespeare's most famous roles such as Laertes, Tybalt, Oberon and Othello. He wrote American Moor (referring to Shakespeare’s Othello) in response to years of audition rooms and theatre makers limiting black actors’ abilities to tell their own stories.
American Moor is a play about an African-American actor auditioning for the role of Shakespeare’s black hero, Othello, opposite a much younger white director who believes he truly knows how the character should be performed. The actor goes on to question the white director and have an honest debate with him, sometimes aloud and other times only for the audience’s ears. The play leaves us in a standoff, and Cobb says, “the readers of the play will need to decide for themselves.”
Reactions to American Moor have been strong, and Hamilton Cobb says many different types of people all relate to his story. What Hamiliton Cobb says he wants is for audiences to listen. Audiences can’t see American Moor in the theatre these days, but they have been tuning in to watch it streamed online and participating in discussions held by multiple theatres, including Oregon Shakespeare. Hamilton Cobb says the best reaction he has heard is when an audience member stood up at the end of the play and said, “That’s my story.”

Places to learn more about Keith Hamilton Cobb:
http://www.keithhamiltoncobb.com/
https://americanmoor.com/
This post is also available on our Substack page. Subscribe to get Black History Month updates delivered directly to your inbox: https://upstartcrows.substack.com/p/coming-soon?r=f72uf&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy&fbclid=IwAR1HwrK-A8Bs3EpFspPNQe5UCP_1436m2pVII9UMlVb3i1sPCVm4DLFJPwk

Noma Dumezweni has the magic to accomplish anything. Performing consistently as an actor on stage and in films, this former refugee has gained many accolades and become respected in the Shakespeare community and elsewhere. Dumezweni has starred in Shakespeare plays on many stages in England and the US, including Antony and Cleopatra, Much Ado About Nothing, Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar and The Winter’s Tale for the Royal Shakespeare Company, and many other plays at other theatres. In 2001, she played a witch for Director Gregory Doran’s film version of Macbeth. Outside of Shakespeare, her best known stage role is probably Hermonie Granger in the West End and on Broadway in Harry Potter and The Cursed Child. Dumezweni’s film and TV credits are endless, including Doctor Who, Shameless, Mary Poppins Returns and The Undoing.
But Dumezweni’s life didn’t begin with Hollywood glamour—she was born in Swaziland in 1969 and came to London as a refugee at 7 years old. She said she remembers the fears of her and her sister being the only kids of color in her school, “I remember those feelings of anxiety, like ‘I’m not the prettiest at all.’ You try and make yourself small because you don't want to make people feel uncomfortable.” Dumezweni recalls watching movies as a child and wishing she could be the stars on screen. She said it was Theatre that got her through the tough years at school. She auditioned for Drama School twice before being accepted to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and a brilliant career followed.
With her long list of credits behind her, and two Laurence Oliver Awards and a Tony nomination, Dumezweni doesn’t have to dream of being an icon. She already is. In her Oliver acceptance speech, she said, "I am a refugee child. We've done alright, haven't we?"
When asked about the Black Lives Matter movement, she says, “What's extraordinary is that this is a worldwide movement. It's not a political movement. It's a movement of humanity."

Learn more about Dumezweni here:
https://www.broadway.com/buzz/stars/noma-dumezweni/profile/
https://shakespeareinaction.wordpress.com/tag/noma-dumezweni/

This post is also available on our Substack page. Subscribe to have Black History Month updates delivered directly to your inbox: https://upstartcrows.substack.com/p/coming-soon?r=f72uf&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy&fbclid=IwAR3ZkHJBLVigtojO4g2J11r8E5TQE_Ag1572q--eErzswh8gyAZDQ67ABIM