Cymbeline Post-Mortem

by Nicholas E. Sheets, dramaturg

Now that the production crew held their post-mortem, Cymbeline is officially over. What a fun ride this has been, especially as you have interacted with the show via the 4thWALL, in schools, at BYU and the many other locations we took this show. I hope you see how committed we are to bringing quality theater to our community and I personally hope you felt that we tried hard to help your voice be heard through blog postings, interacting with the actors and all the wonderful feedback we’ve received.

In our post-mortems at BYU we discuss the several aspects we felt were challenging and engaging, and then provide our thoughts as to what could make our shows even better next year. In these meetings we have various faculty members who oversaw us students, and after they discuss their viewpoints, we join them at the table. This is a great opportunity to reflect on the past show and everything we went through to provide quality theater experiences to our community.

As dramaturg, I was especially grateful to create teachers packets for the schools to use before we arrived. It was interesting to tackle Common Core Standards as I looked for ways to legitimize my material for an elementary/middle-school classroom. I also wanted students to see how much fun theater can be. I couldn’t have done any of this without help from the director, Teresa Love. Also, I was super grateful to see the autograph sections of the study guide used to such a great extent that many children were able to approach the actors and find inspiration in theater. My time at BYU is now at an end, but I hope you will always know that BYU’s Theater for Young Audiences, as well as all future dramaturgs, are committed to you, the community.

Thank you again,

Nicholas E. Sheets

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[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="376"] Margaret Roper[/caption] Margaret More Roper: Scholar and Daughter by Adam White, dramaturg Thomas More was a family man; he was married twice and had four children with his first wife, Jane Colt. After being married for six years, Jane Colt More died, leaving More with four children: Margaret, Elizabeth, Cecily and John. However, More quickly remarried to the widow Dame Alice Middleton, marrying her within a month of his wife’s death. While many of his friends resisted the rapid nature of the arrangement, More went through with it. Thomas and Alice More would raise the four children Thomas More had with Jane, as well as Alice’s daughter from her previous marriage and a foster daughter. Certainly, More valued his family and the welfare of his children. More also valued the power of education. He insisted that his daughters be educated through rigorous schooling, and this was unusual in 16th-century England, as society at large believed women unfit for scholarly pursuits. Despite cultural and institutional norms, Margaret More, the eldest of the More children (and More’s favorite, some would argue), would grow to become one of the most educated people in all of England, a woman of great scholarly knowledge. Margaret More Roper was tutored at home and became well-known for her studies, particularly for her adeptness in Greek and Latin. Her skill in writing and speaking Latin would impress the clergy of England. This specialty is reflected in a scene in Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons where Margaret and King Henry VIII engage in a bit of Latin language sparring. She would also become the first woman who was not of royal birth to publish a translated book. In October 1524, Roper published an English translation of a book called ‘Precatio dominica’ written by Thomas More’s good friend Erasmus. This book was based on the Lord’s Prayer. Instead of translating the book directly from Latin to English, Roper would use her extensive knowledge of both languages to construct the themes and the meanings Erasmus had written in to the treatise with her own words. [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="291"] Erasmus, Dutch humanist and good friend to Thomas More[/caption] It was Margaret who would visit the imprisoned Thomas More the most often. They were very close, writing letters to one another regularly the duration of their relationship. It was in a letter to Margaret that Thomas More confided, “I do nobody harm, I say none harm, I thinke none harm, but wish everybody good. And if this be not enough to keep a man alive, in good faith I long not to live.” We have good reason to believe that Margaret More Roper very well understood what would be her father’s fate. After Thomas More’s execution, Margaret More Roper and her husband William Roper would continue to carry on his legacy in their own ways. William Roper would write the first biography of Thomas More, a glowing and gracious document that would influence our understanding of More’s personality for hundreds of years to come. Margaret More Roper actually kept her father’s head after his beheading, pickling it to preserve it from decay. While many of us may find that historical tidbit a tad macabre, I would like to believe that Margaret More Roper had deep admiration for her father; perhaps it was out of this feeling she kept his head. Please stay tuned to the 4th Wall Dramaturgy Blog to catch clips of my interview with Mallory Gee, the actress who will portray Margaret More Roper in BYU’s A Man for All Seasons. Bibliography: Abernathy, Susan. "Margaret Roper, Daughter of Sir Thomas More." Early Modern England. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Feb. 2014. Duerden, Richard. "A Man for All Seasons." Telephone interview. 31 Jan. 2014. "Margaret Roper." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 28 Sept. 2013. Web. 02 Oct. 2013. "Sir Thomas More Quotes and Quotations." Sir Thomas More Quotes and Quotations. Luminarium. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.

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Cymbeline Post-Mortem

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