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Kaffeine Buzz
reviews independent and foreign films,
in addition to reporting the latest buzz behind
Colorado's film festivals.
Shakespeare Behind Bars
(Hank Rogerson)
“As you from crimes would pardoned be.
Let your indulgence set me free.”
This line within the epilogue of William Shakespeare’s
play, The Tempest, rings a loud chord
and represents the essence of this documentary,
set within the walls of Kentucky’s Luther
Luckett Correctional Complex.
Shakespeare Behind Bars
is an annual production that has taken place for
over seven years, where convicted felons within
this prison work with volunteer director Curt
Tofteland, learning, rehearsing, and choosing
their own roles to play that best fit their own
personal views of who they are and what they’ve
done. This time the play was The Tempest,
which was one of the last plays written by Shakespeare
and one the director felt best expressed the final
journeys some of these inmates were taking as
they prepared for parole.
This film not only provides an honest look at
life behind bars, but at the men who, through
the performance of this play, identify with its
characters and discover a deeper sense of why
they committed the crimes that led to their incarceration.
It was painful to see each man expressing their
history and patterns of child abuse and neglect
by fathers and mothers, which eventually led to
their violent crimes.
The cast is made up of what the director Tofteland
called "the dregs of society," but he
also felt if the playwright had known these men
back then, they could have easily made it on to
Shakespeare’s Global stage. The film replaces
the prisoner number with a person, as each man
face his fear, pulling off the emotional, protective
mask in order to really excel at his craft. The
lines are cathartic, providing a tale of discovery,
of forgiveness of self and of others, and of letting
go. Through this process, many of them expressed
the deep desire for redemption, and to be given
a chance to bring balance within the totality
of their lives by someday being given another
chance to contribute to society.
Shakespeare Behind Bars is insightful
and even spiritual. The lead character, Prospero,
has a line towards the end of the play that surmises
how the rarer action is in virtue rather than
in vengeance, which is the opposite of his original
plan for revenge that began the play. And as the
film shows many times, the ones who need mercy
most are the ones who deserve it the least, but
without forgiveness how can healing and evolution
ever take place?
It has often been said by literary greats such
as Ben Johnson at the time of Shakespeare’s
death, by Al Pacino in his documentary Finding
Richard about breaking down the play Richard
the III, and by the director of these plays:
that Shakespeare’s writings were timeless.
His insights into human behavior that inspired
37 plays and numerous sonnets are as true and
relevant today as they were 400 years ago. Thankfully,
his words are still being used today to educate
and even help heal, and thankfully, director Hank
Rogerson has presented one of the many
ways this is happening within a population that
society would like to forget.
http://www.internationalfilmcircuit.com/shakespeare/
-Kim Owens, April 11, 2006
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