This April, the Dana Center will serve as the venue for New Art Theatre in William Shakespeare’s The Tempest, directed by the Dana Center’s own Bob Shea.

The Bard’s final work brings a story of a shipwreck, magic, and young love. The magician and main character Prospero lives in isolation until the shipwreck that brings the other characters into his story.

Professor Gary Bouchard of the English department was involved in choosing the play to be incorporated into Conversatio.

“When we were developing the Conversatio program I suggested The Tempest as a representative Shakespeare play,” said Bouchard. “It is a play so suited to the Art and Beauty unit because it really is ultimately the depiction of a grand artist at work in Prospero and in Shakespeare.  Prospero essentially writes, directs and acts in his own revenge tragedy, comedy, masque and romance, before stepping out of his costume and breaking his props and surrendering his power back to the audience in the end.”

This performance will replace a previously held showing of the 2010 movie version of The Tempest, starring Helen Mirren as Prospera, because, as committee member Professor Ann Holbrook says, “The Tempest is a Shakespeare play, and plays are written to be performed live”.

Professor Holbrook went on to say, “We always desired to create community among students and professors, which included the communal viewing of live performances and films. We especially wanted students to see a play, given that most students would have seen very few and because watching actors perform in real time on a stage is so different from watching films or TV or videos of any kind.”

When it was decided that a live performance of the play should be produced, the Conversatio department turned to Bob Shea to direct.

Shea, Saint Anselm’s director of special events and director of the Dana Center, agreed take on the position. Shea is an experienced thespian and has received the Francis Grover Cleveland Lifetime Achievement Award for his creative and positive work in the theatre.

Professor Bouchard has complete faith in Shea. “Bob Shea’s NewArt company will, I am sure, render a version of the play that will be provocative and challenging for the students, as well as entertaining.”

Bouchard shares his colleague’s opinion on the importance of presenting this iconic piece on stage rather than film.

“Shakespeare on film is a great treat in our contemporary age, but Shakespeare wrote plays, and there is no substitute for a live performance of one of his plays,” explains Bouchard. “He wrote for the stage with all of its possibilities and limitations and that is how our students should experience this play.”

Professor Holbrook added, “The play asks many questions: do artists work better pursuing individual visions without social or political pressures? Do artists have an ethical responsibility to share their talent and insight with others? Does art change the world? Can artists gain ‘divine’ knowledge through the creative act?”

Bouchard shares her enthusiasm for the new event and its place in the Conversatio curriculum.

He says, “We begin Conversatio each year with a live performance of Antigone in Theatre Kapow’s rendition of Seamus Heaney’s Burial at Thebes. To bookend the program with a live performance of The Tempest—well that is such stuff as dreams are made on, or at least good curricula.”

Performances will include student matinees with special talk-back sessions on Wednesday, April 5 at 9:30 a.m. and Thursday, April 6 at 9:30 a.m. There will also be public performances on Wednesday April 5 at 7:30 p.m. and Thursday, April 6 7:30 p.m.