Meet the Cast - Becca Petersen as Clara Johnson

By Kristen Leinbach, Dramaturg

When asked about writing The Light in the Piazza and about the relationships of the characters, Craig Lucas said the following

“Clara apprehends the world differently than her mother. [Margaret] goes through Italy with a guidebook. But the girl sees experiences, she sees the light in the piazza. She literally experiences the light as representative of her deepest feelings…That’s why the score has moments where words no longer suffice or are no longer important. It’s the feeling and light. Those things carry us. Human beings are just a conduit for love. I think Clara sees that. Love comes before her and after her.”

I asked Becca Petersen, portraying Clara Johnson, to share a little about her life as well as her experience getting to really know Clara.

“I am Becca Petersen from Carmel, Indiana. I am a senior studying Music Dance Theatre. I will be graduating in April with plans of moving to New York City! At BYU I have performed in PETER PAN as well as two years in the Young Ambassadors traveling to Southern Africa and China. These past two summers I have performed professionally at The Muny and Music Theatre of Wichita. Aside from musical theatre I love to go thrift shopping, take naps, eat out, and spend time with my friends and family.

Clara Johnson has always been one of my dream roles and I could not be more excited and grateful to have the opportunity to play her.

The Light in the Piazza follows Clara and her mother, Margaret, as they travel through Italy. Clara is a very youthful girl who lives life exactly in the moment. She is bright-eyed as she sees and experiences this new place for the first time. The plot is centered around relationships: Clara’s relationship with her mother and her new budding relationship with a Florentine boy, Fabrizio. I feel that I connect with Clara on many levels. I love to travel, explore, and see new places. Because of previous travel opportunities I have had I understand what it is like experiencing different cultures and having to figure out how you fit in. In the show many of the characters, including Clara, go through big life transitions. Currently I can relate as I am getting ready to graduate, preparing to move to NY, having family members and close friends get married, and trying to understand love and relationships of my own. All of these experiences can be scary but can also be incredible if we let ourselves learn, grow, and live in them. We must allow ourselves to find the happiness and joy in all things we experience. In essence, that is what Clara does. Clara finds what makes her happy.”

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by Christian Riboldi, dramaturg Welcome back to the 4th Wall. Today we're going to cover the basic overview of the plot for Twelfth Night. Unlike Romeo and Juliet, the plot for Twelfth Night might not be as widely known to most of you. I know I had to brush up my Shakespeare in order to remember. First let's cover our basic characters. Orsino: He's a...you guessed it, duke, who is in love with Olivia. Olivia: A wealthy maid who is the fairest of them all. Viola: Twin to Sebastian and main heroine of the story. When dressed as a boy she goes by the name Cesario. Sebastian: Twin to Viola. Get's lost at he very beginning of the story. Malvolio: Servant to Viola and in charge of the other servants. A little on the snooty side. Sir Toby: Olivia's Uncle. He's a little loud and good friends with Feste and Maria. Feste: The town fool. In this town he is a man of many talents. Maria: Olivia's hand maiden, though she quite spunky. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="416"] Joseph Timms as Sebastian (left) and Samuel Barnett as Viola (right) in the Globe Theater.[/caption] There you have it. In this cutting of our show those are all of the characters. The show starts out with Sebastian and Viola getting separated by a storm. The now desperate Viola decides that to make it on her own she will need to find work, which she can't to as a woman, so she dresses as a man and calls herself Cesario. Cesario get's hired by Orsino and is told to run an errand to tell the fair Olivia that Orsino is still in love with her. Viola does this but begins to realize that she likes Orsino, and wishes that he liked her back. While at Olivia's, Viola/Cesario is so good at wooing that Olivia begins to fall for Cesario. Meanwhile Malvolio is telling off all of the servants and Sir Toby for being rowdy, so Sir Toby, Feste, and Maria decide to play a trick on Malvolio. Maria writes a letter pretending she is Olivia declaring her love for Malvolio. The letter convinces Malvolio that Olivia is really in love with him. Sebastian has now finally found his way back after the storm. When he enters the town Olivia throws herself at him, thinking that he is Cesario and tells him that they need to get married right now. Sebastian is surprised but goes along with it because it's not everyday that he has women begging to marry him. In the end Malvolio makes a fool of himself, Sebastian and Viola reunite, and Viola and Orsino get married. Finally after all of this you may be wondering to yourself, what in the world does this have to do with a Twelfth Night? A lot of people wonder the same thing. I think it would be best to let one of our character explain what it seems to be referring to. This is a snippet from an explanation Malvolio offers at the beginning or our version of the show. "Actually it’s called twelfth night as a reference to the twelfth night after Christmas day, called the Eve of the Feast of Epiphany, which is a carnvialesque celebration where roles were reversed, based on the ancient Roman festival of Staurnalia. Scholars argue about whether or not Shakespeare wrote it to celebrate the actual holiday, or if the title just refers to the topsy-turvy world suggested by this beloved festival – an interpretation that is supported by the subtitle, “What Your Will.” There you have it folks. Now that you know what Twelfth Night is about you can recognize the story when you see it. Next time we're going to be talking about some different adaptations of that this play has gone through. Until next time.

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by Christian Riboldi, dramaturg Welcome back to the 4th wall. The purpose of these blog posts is provide our audiences with inside information about these productions to enhance their experience with the show. This may include information about rehearsals, background research, and even sneak peaks into what the show will look like. As you know, recently we were able to begin our rehearsals for Twelfth Night. This week I'd like to share some little known facts about Shakespeare and his life. I hope that in preparation for Twelfth Night, getting to know Shakespeare a little better will help all of us appreciate his masterful work more. So let's take a moment and get to know the Bard of Avon. William Shakespeare was born in a town called Stratford-upon-Avon on or near April 23rd 1564. William was the third child of eight in his family. His parents most likely couldn’t read or write. William got married at age 18 to Anne Hathaway; they had 8 children with one set of twins. It’s believed that William started his career as an actor, and he acted in many of his own shows. In the time of William Shakespeare, a bard was a poet who shared his poems by reciting them to others. One of Shakespeare’s common titles is "The Great Bard" because he his seen by many as the most influential writer and storyteller in the English language. Shakespeare was a literary genius. In his time, some of the laborers had a vocabulary of 300 words of less. Shakespeare, on the other hand, used 28,829 unique word forms in his works. A wordsmith is an inventor of words. Shakespeare invented over 1700 words that we now use in our everyday language. As a poet and playwright, Shakespeare wrote 154 sonnets and 37 plays. Most of Shakespeare’s writing is poetic. Shakespeare wrote most of his plays in a poetic style called iambic pentameter. Iambic pentameter is a style of writing where every line has exactly 10 syllables, and every other syllable is a little stronger than the one before it. For example, the opening line of Twelfth Night is: “If music be the food of love, play on;” Shakespeare’s sonnets usually rhyme and are all exactly 14 lines longs. A successful businessman, Shakespeare bought expensive property throughout Stratford, and was a co-owner of the Globe Theater. Well there you have it—a few interesting facts about one of the greatest English writers of all time. Next time we'll be talking a little bit more about Twelfth Night and finding out why the show is called that in the first place. Until next time.

Meet the Cast - Becca Petersen as Clara Johnson

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