We've got a twist on Shakespeare's comedy
of a mistaken identity and self discovery.
The musical adaption of 12th
Night is Seattle Shakespeare
Company's first ever full music,
and it's playing right now at te
Seattle Center here to perform.
I am She from 12th Night
or Alexandra Henderson,
Alexandria Henderson and Andy Alhadov.
I have a confession to make.
I sent you a ring. It was a stupid mistake.
I was desperate for any excuse
to get to see you again.
Oh, God, I'm embarrassed.
You probably think I'm insane.
Do you think I'm insane?
I. It must be so obvious.
Isn't it obvious I can no longer contain it.
I've been shielding my feelings as I grieve,
But now I'm wearing my heart. I'm asleep and.
Saying you see me for who I really am,
my shame and my bride.
I just can't hide from you.
So put me out of my misery
because I am your woman. I am s.
I am your woman. I am she. I.
Pity you. But pity is compassio.
So that means you must feel passion for me.
And not exactly you.
Tell me, please, what you want to sleep.
Think of me now.
I think you're fooling yourself.
And so are you.
Oh, honey, if only you knew.
I wish that you'd see me the waI
want you to. You're lover frien.
You're sexy when you yell.
So put me out of my misery becae
I am your woman. Not for me.
I am your woman.
Never be.
You don't understand.
I am not the person that I used to be lately.
Try and see it through my eyes.
You make me feel like I can start opening.
I wouldn't love me if I were you, but I do.
So please put me ahead of my my
mystery for sure. Not my woman.
I will be. I've got no woman.
I am shot for, man. Am shot for.
I am shot for. I am shot for me.
Oh my gosh, Alexandria, Andy, I I think
hearing your voices together is is one
of the most beautiful things that we've
heard on this set.
Truly. It's just oh wow,
I loved that song.
It was fun.
It's really fantastic.
And it is part
of the original Shakespeare pla,
12th Night. But what is 12th Night about?
Yeah, so it's a lot about
a little bit of the run down of the story.
So my character Viola and her
twin brother are shipwrecked.
She lands on this island,
Illyria, and she's like, wow,
I don't know what to do.
She the, the townspeople introduce her to
Olivia and the Duke Orsino who run the town.
And I'm like, wow,
I would like to work for her.
And they go, oh, she's not hiri,
but Orsino's hiring, but it only hires men.
So Viola dresses herself as Ces.
And becomes the the servant to this Duke.
And the Duke says I want you to go after
Olivia and tell her how much I love her.
And in the process she falls
in love with Cesario. Oh
my goodness. It's
really great love triangle.
There are lots of other high jis
that happen in the show. It's jt
about mistaken. I didn't these her twin
brother Sebastian shows up and n
they're like mistaken for each other.
It is hilarious. And what a rom.
It's so much fun. Is this the ft
version actually set in Seattle?
Yeah. Well, it's sort of, yeah. So our our
director Ruben really wanted tok
about the Seattle community to t
like really show the vibrancy ad
diversity of the Seattle commun.
So in theater sometimes you have these
kind of multiple things going o.
We're in Illyria, we're in a ti,
we're not in a time.
We're in Seattle, we're not in Seattle.
Kind of lots of layers,
but but really the idea was to .
Ground ourselves in the Seattle
community and and experience joy
and show the joy that we all wao
kind of erupt with from from tis
that have been sort of challeng.
Yes.
And this show has a lot of thatd
and recovering from grief and ls
and and then finding your way an
well I feel the joy.
But Speaking of challenging,
Y'all had a bump in the road recently.
You were supposed to start a couple of weeks
ago. But what happened? Yeah, C.
COVID is doing its ugly head.
So a couple of our cast members
are down with the coronavirus.
So we send them lots of love
and help and speedy, speedy,
speedy, speedy recovery.
So we did like a F opening.
We called it last Friday.
Yeah, where we had like a concert version.
And so we're hoping to be back t
week and going from I think Tuey
through Sunday to to give the world some.
Joy and some hope in these hard times.
Even a concert version with these voices
would be 1000% amazing and beautiful.
You are primarily musical theater actors.
How do you feel about the lyricm
of Shakespeare and how does it t
into the musical theater format?
Because I studied Shakespeare ad
it's hard enough for me to say ,
let alone sing it. Yeah.
So I first of all think that
Shakespeare is very musical.
Like the speech itself is very musical.
And I think that this adaptation
lends itself to how you can come
the both of them, the lyrical p.
Like, plain speak, if you will,
of Shakespeare and the melodic
harmonies of music that goes through it.
And this show kind of makes it accessible.
So if you, if you've often thought like, oh,
Shakespeare seems like like, come see it,
you'll be brought in and you'll,
oh, I can do it too.
That's one. Another
great aspect to this musical is
actually introducing people to
Shakespeare for the first time,
which I think is amazing.
You're both good friends off the stage too.
You can see it, you can feel it.
How does that impact the
dynamic when you play opposite?
Oh, it's really hard. I'm not
going hard because, like, Olivia
falls for Cesario and
Cesario is turning her down
and I'm just like, I'm looking y
friend every night and going, y,
it's really hard. I know my job is quite
easy because all I have to
do is fall in love with her,
which is not hard, which is not hard.
But it's like we we've actually been,
we have never done a show together for real.
We were in rehearsals for sister
act when the pandemic hit and we
were on our second day of tech.
And we did it. And so we though,
Okay, we're going to do it.
And this
is our chance.
And we are going to get back.
We're going to do it. Yeah.
So Okay, I cannot wait
to see this. Thank you both for coming
this morning and sharing your voices,
sharing your gift.
Cannot wait to see this.
And I'm sure you can't either.
So Seattle Shakespeare Company's 12th
night is playing through May 21st at the
Center Theatre in the Seattle Center.
Get out there and enjoy.
And best of luck to all your cat
members who are recovering right now.