University of South Dakota (Vermillion, South Dakota)
Red Bull Theater’s Sardanapalus & Global Watch Party Review
By Lara Carlson McGoey
Thirty community members and faculty, staff, and students from the University of South Dakota in Vermillion, SD, attended the watch party on October 29th at our local movie theater. Dr. Lisa Ann Robertson introduced the play and provided background information on Lord Byron. Then, Dr. Darlene Farabee explained closet dramas to contextualize what kind of audience Byron was writing for. The stage reading featured the cast with very minimal costuming and props added.
In the stage reading, the actors added more humor throughout the play. For instance, in Act III, Sardanapalus has witty retorts that add a comedic flair when addressing the serious and judgmental Salemenes. Sardanapalus’s delivery of “All passions in excess are female” (3.1.381) poked humor at an underlying theme of the play: gender and gender performance. While Sardanapalus is described as a “she-king” (2.1.48), it is Salemenes in this scene that portrays an “excess” of emotion, demonstrated by the anger and frustration presented by the actor.
Following the play viewing, Dr. Robertson’s graduate seminar students and a couple of community members met for discussion. Students questioned how this reading of the play differed from what they might have expected from a live action performance with a set, props, and costumes. One of the major themes, gender, was also discussed, especially the repetition of the term “unmanning” in the last third of the play. Dr. Robertson and students further analyzed the historical context of the story and how Byron’s contemporary struggles may have influenced the way he wrote the play.
Other topics for discussion included appropriation and orientalism, the historical representation of queer bodies, and the shift Byron made to portray Sardanapalus as a peace-loving character. Students also wondered if the choice to stream this production was influenced by current international conflict; in other words, what connections can we make to Sardanapalus via our current political climate internationally?
Multiple audience members and students in the following discussion mentioned how exciting it was to have the opportunity to view a stage reading of a play that has been performed so infrequently. Sardanapalus brought together the town community and the campus community to partake in an exclusive event, and everyone left with a stronger sense of the importance of the humanities and fine arts.
