As part of the Greater Victoria Shakespeare Festival, director Barbara Poggemiller will be presenting Shakespeare’s As You Like It. Poggemiller says the play—being presented at The Horticulture Centre of the Pacific, the fest’s second time there after leaving longtime home of Camosun in 2020 due to construction, and new venue Esquimalt Gorge Park—is very much a traditional Shakespeare comedy.
“It’s called a comedy and in the comedies of Shakespeare, they have happy endings,” says Poggemiller. “But often they start tragically, so there is usually something in a comedy that begins with the world out of balance, so that during the play, the balance can be restored. And that happens in this play.”
Poggemiller says that the play deals with the universal themes of love and nature.
“Love is definitely the main theme of this play, and also another theme is that when everyone leaves the court because they’ve been banished… they all realize how wonderful it is to live close to nature. When you are in court and you have all of the courtly responsibilities and manners, you’re not in touch with nature in the same way, and everybody recognizes when they are out in the forest that there is some blessing to be found in a simpler life, and that is a beautiful theme.”
Poggemiller says that the best part of getting As You Like It together was helping her actors find their characters.
“I think what I liked best was working with the actors in each scene, and discovering what that scene holds and discovering all the different moments in the scene, and finding a way to bring that to life,” she says. “I really love that work, and even on my own, thinking about it and imagining it, it’s very creative. It’s a very creative experience and I feel very lucky to have that.”
For Poggemiller, directing means trying to tell the best story possible.
“Directing to me means having a sense of how you are going to tell the story,” she says. “Because we were outside, it was about imagining the place we were in and where the different scenes will take place and how we can bring a play to life in a way that is exciting for the actors and exciting for the audience. I guess that a big part of directing for me is wanting to help the actors find the truth of their characters, and wanting to help the audience understand and experience the world of the play.”
As You Like It
Various times, until July 16
$25, The Horticulture Centre of the Pacific and Esquimalt Gorge Park
vicshakespeare.com