Shakespeare and Performing Arts Mary Baldwin University

Interview: Mary Baldwin University MLitt-MFA Program

I caught up with Masters students Rosemary Armato and Mili Koncelik about the Mary Baldwin University Master of Letters Degree (MLitt) & Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program in which they are enrolled. (More interviews here.)

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If you'd rather read the interview, a rough transcript is below.

Interview with Mary Baldwin University Grad Students Rosemary Armato and Mili Koncelik

Michael Van Osch: Hi, it's Michael Van Osch. Welcome to Hark Journal. We have another great interview for you today. And today I'm happy to welcome a couple of ladies from Staunton, Virginia at the Mary Baldwin University. And, we have today Rosemary Armato and Mili Koncelik, welcome girls. How are you?

Thanks for joining us. This is excellent. I really want to find out a little bit about the program that you've got going up there, that you are both attending. And let's start off with that. So you're at Mary Baldwin University. That's in Staunton, Virginia. And tell, tell me about the program.

Rosemary Armato: So it's a double master's program, which means that Mili and I both graduated last year with our Masters of Letters in Shakespeare in Performance. And right now we're working on our second master's degree, which is a Master of Fine Arts in Shakespeare in Performance.

Michael Van Osch: Wow. Okay. So how, how what's the life of each, each of the programs then that you've done?

Mili Koncelik: So the first degree is the first two years of the program. And then the MFA spans the final year. And for both of them, you take classes that lead into both. So the MLitt, you take classes that lead into how you work in the MFA with, directing, dramaturgy and a very heavy text focus and a company model.

Michael Van Osch: Wow. Okay. So you're there for three years total. So, Rosemary, let's start with you. You're from Dallas. And what, what made you decide to attend this program and at Mary Baldwin?

Rosemary Armato: Great. So when I graduated, I graduated with a double major in drama and English. And so I was really looking for a program that suited both of those, both of those areas of interest. I'm really interested in the theatrical side of a text and also vice versa. So I was looking for a program that would allow me to do both and I came to be visit Staunton. And I don't know if you've ever seen it here, but it's beautiful. It's a great little city and I fell in love and I signed up and I just, I made the decision basically a week before the program started and I just packed, packed up my little Volkswagen and I drove a thousand miles and I'm here.

Michael Van Osch: Fantastic. Great. And Mili you're a Charlotte, North Carolina native. I, I think I got that right. And, yeah, same question. What, what led you to decide to attend this program at Mary Baldwin?

Mili Koncelik: In fall of 2016, I came to see a show at the American Shakespeare Center, which is also in Staunton and the program has a partnership with them and I got to see King Lear.

And one of the fun things that the ASC does is they have seating on stage. Like how Shakespeare would have. And I luckily or unluckily got to sit on stage for it. And I immediately was hooked. It's one of the best theatrical moments I experienced. And I found out through that show that the program existed and that they have that heavy focus on doing shows how Shakespeare would have done with audience interaction.

And I was hooked. So I was like, how can I get into this program? How can I find out about them? I went to the southeastern theater conference that following spring and met Doreen and Matt who are heads of the MFA and who work as recruiters for the program. But it's like, how can I get into this program?

I would love this. And then I applied, got in and moved from Charlotte all the way up here.

Michael Van Osch: Fantastic. Yeah, I have been the Staunton and it is a lovely little town. Absolutely. And of course, what you're referring to is the Blackfriars Playhouse there at the American Shakespeare Center. And for those that don't know, just look up American Shakespeare Center and you'll see, it's just a wonderful theater and it's a replica of Shakespeare's indoor theater. Am I correct?

Yeah, it's a, it's a phenomenal place. So Mili let's stay with you. Why Shakespeare? I mean, besides what you experienced there, when you saw it, what were you heavily involved with Shakespeare before?

Mili Koncelik: In my undergrad, not really. That same fall that I came here was my first Shakespeare production Othello and I loved it. And I think after the class I was taking, and after coming here, I started more and more getting interested in Shakespeare. Yeah. And there's this big claim that like, I agree with and also disagree with that Shakespeare is universal. I agree with it, but I also don't agree with it, with how I think in Shakespeare there's something for every single person, but not for every single experience.

There was Pericles Prince of Tyre, which kind of sparked my light interest in it. And then it continued growing. And then it led to me being able to direct Pericles this year.

Michael Van Osch: Wow. Fantastic. And Rosemary, same question because it's very interesting and you know, it's, there is a lot to Shakespeare obviously, but were you heavily involved with it before the program or did you, what made you make the jump to this program to focus solely on Shakespeare?

Rosemary Armato: Right. So as far as Shakespeare goes, I hadn't, I only worked on, I think, two different Shakespeare productions before coming here, but I I'd read my way through, at least all the comedies and most of the tragedies and the reason I love Shakespeare so much is because of the humans he's created. I loved reading as a child and I always joke that my closest friends were characters from books.

And the reason I love, I love Shakespeare's characters is because they are just, they're so fully developed. I find myself saying all the time, like, Oh, Juliet, wouldn't do that. Like I know her. Right. Or like Romeo would never, it's just it's because they feel so real. And I want as much of it as I can get. And the deeper I get into these plays and these texts, if they're just more alive to me, right.

Michael Van Osch: For sure. the, the program, talks about, master of letters and MFA in Shakespeare and performance. Rosemary, can you explain that a little to the folks that may not know what that means?

Rosemary Armato: Great. So what that means is for the MLitt we're looking mostly textually. So reading through the plays, reading through the body of research, but we are also using everything that we're gaining from that textual side of things to put it into performance.

So we're not just a scholar is looking at the plays and analyzing the words on the page. We're not just looking at iambs. We're also figuring out how do you put this on stage? How do we make this as real for the audience as it is to us on this page? Yeah.

Michael Van Osch: And did I read that? I think both of you are looking at a focus on directing.

Is that right? Tell me about that a little bit. Mili, is there other options to focus on directing or acting or dramaturgy, or how does, how does that all fall out?

Mili Koncelik: So in the MFA, in the May term, which happens before you start the fall and jumped straight into the company model, you all come together, and you decide individually what you want your concentrations to be.

Then you decide your seasonal plays for the company. So, Rosemary and I were both like, yes, we would like to be directors, another company member, Jason Stephan is our third directing concentration. And then, if you don't pick directing, there's the acting focus, there's the dramaturgy focus. And then there's the stage management slash design position. So, with costumes or with set or with props, you can get focus in that.

Michael Van Osch: Wow. Okay. So it really covers all the, all the angles. So continuing with that there, you mentioned your company. So tell me about Fireside Shakespeare Company and how that fits into the program. And yeah. What, what goes on with that?

Rosemary Armato: Right. So we developed the company, as Mili mentioned in May in the May term. So we all sat, you know, behind our little cameras, you know, on zoom, trying to pitch a season. So essentially what that means is we, we go through this kind of grueling process of, I like this play for this reason, we should do this for this company for this reason.

And, you know, have developed the mission statement. So we're trying to figure out which plays that into who we are as a company. And I think how many weeks was it?

Mili Koncelik: It may term lasts in whole four weeks. And for. The first week you don't touch any pitching of plays, but then the second two weeks you pitch, and then the final week you decide on that Friday.

So for the slots that we have, there's a 60 minute education show, two 90 minutes small scales where the company splits in half. We have a Blackfriars show where we have a guest director come and direct us at the Blackfriars Playhouse. And then we have a Renaissance show, which is how Shakespeare's company would have done it.

So we get a week. To memorize, to costume, to prop and to block the entire thing by ourselves with no director. So those were the slots we were pitching for. And on that final Friday, we now hold the record of the longest, seasoned picking of having over nine hours worth of, not necessarily fights, but conversations of what plays we should do.

Wow. Yeah, we had like a 45 minute lunch break and then we came right. Came right back – here we are we don't know how to feel about these plays. And then, so from picking those plays, it moves into who's going to direct what then the next days and where do we all fall, concentration wise?

Rosemary Armato: Right. And so what that means also, so we decided the director and then we also looked at, who's going to costume design, who's going to stage manage.

So everyone in the company fills a slot in this production team.

Michael Van Osch: Yeah including the actors. Right? So how many people are in the company? So you've got nine hours worth of going back and forth on how to pick it. How many people are in this process?

Mili Koncelik: We have 14 company members and then we had two faculty moderators during the process who would tally our votes, where they lied and make sure that we were fully working for the best of the company at all times.

Michael Van Osch: Wow. Yeah. That's amazing. so how has, how has COVID changed things for you because. Did you both started before COVID was going? Correct. So you've had you had at least a year, was it, or two years before and then COVID hit. So what has happened to you and the program because of that, and then secondarily, do you feel like you've learned something through the whole COVID?

Mili Koncelik: Yeah. Back in March, the program got the, and the school got the, okay we're shutting down, we're moving online, bit, and then. We initially hoped that our may term would not be all online, but with how COVID continued to progress, we knew that it was going to be online. We worked through that and then figured, well, we have to see what will happen if we'll be online in the fall, or if we'll be able to be in person.

Luckily we were able to be in person and we spent from when we started in August, up until now, we spend every day with each other from at least nine to noon. And then some of us have to pull off, but we all are always masked. We have extremely enhanced safety measures where there are buckets of sanitizing wipes, and every day we have to wipe down.

And I don't think any of us were expecting it. But we have definitely made the best with the hand we've been dealt. And Rosemary, you said something that was really interesting when we were talking about this interview about what you've learned from COVID.

Rosemary Armato: So I just, I directed the first show for the season, which was the education show.

And we performed A Midsummer Night's Dream, which was really exciting. And it was a lot of fun, but I was talking about how, one of the things that I learned throughout this. The process is COVID has kind of become like a third character on the stage. It's something that's present in all the minds of anyone who is able to watch our shows in person and that it, for me as a director and for the actors as well, Mili was Hermia it's, it was a really useful tension or obstacle, which was that I think it speaks to one of the most basic human needs and desires, which is to be close to other people and to be touched and to be loved. And so by being able to take.

Being able, by having that taken away from us, it, it was a reminder of how much we need that and how much we want that. And having to push against that desire created some wonderful moments, I think, in the play.

Mili Koncelik: And it also really, I think taught us how, sorry, the sun, whose sun decided to make it.

Michael Van Osch: Yeah, I can see, I can see Mili, but I'm losing Rosemary here.

At least we got sunshine, right?

Rosemary Armato: It's like a filter – nice one.

Michael Van Osch: Oh, okay. Well it's better. That's good. Thanks.

Mili Koncelik: I think something we've learned as a whole company was that even though we're, in this time, there is a serious desire for live theater and to see that interaction happening.

Michael Van Osch: Yeah. you know, of all the people I talked to as well, that's, that's exactly what everyone is saying. I mean, yes, of course, actors and directors, we all want to get back on stage and doing our thing, but anytime you talk to audience members too, it's they just, you know, they can't wait

to see what's, you know, or to get back to, to having that experience of people together. So, yeah, I can certainly appreciate that. So, Rosemary, let's start with you. So graduation happens when?

Rosemary Armato: In May.

Michael Van Osch: So, what's next for you? Or what, what would you like your next step to be after graduation?

Rosemary Armato: Well, that's the big question, isn't it? So I'm applying to different PhD programs to pursue a PhD in English, but I'm also, you know, my heart is torn between making theater. So regardless of what I do, and I think it will be the PhD in English, I will be making theater, I will find a way I always do, it always finds me at least. So definitely I want to keep making theater, but I'm also very interested in the text itself.

So I would like to get my PhD and then the end goal, the big dream is to be a professor and to teach English and to work with theater departments.

Michael Van Osch: Sure I would assume continue directing throughout your life. Sounds good. Mili, how about yourself?

Mili Koncelik: Similarly with, Rosemary I'm would love to head into the PhD track, in performance studies.

A little bit more of a theatrical side of it and how performance has changed throughout the centuries. depending on various factors and or also depending on what the state of the world is come May, I would love to also continue acting or going straight into that theatrical market of any type, an acting job or directing job.

Michael Van Osch: Yeah. So there's a lot going on in the world right now, obviously. And, do you feel, or how do you feel like Shakespeare can, can help pull us together as human beings?

Rosemary Armato: Right. So, the common denominator, if I had to choose one between all of his plays is that they're stories about communities and either their struggle with not allowing love to thrive, if that makes sense, or it's actually. Maybe it would be safe to say that all of them are really about that. It's about a community or a family that just wants to love each other.

And there are obstacles that they either overcome, like they do in the comedies or they don't. So I think that that speaks to the time that we're living in. And as much as we all as a nation are facing, I mean, certainly the biggest obstacle I've ever lived through. I think that's true for most people.

Maybe not most people, but it's certainly the largest obstacle I've ever encountered. It's getting in the way of my livelihood. It's getting in the way of my studies. I can't do many of the things that I love to do, which is we're doing live theater, but it's not the same. And so how do we, as society overcome this obstacle and where is love in this story, whereas love in this narrative.

And I hope this is a comedy and I believe we will find it, but that's why Shakespeare speaks to me right now.

Michael Van Osch: Yeah, well said, Mili, how about yourself?

Mili Koncelik: In a similar vein, with how Shakespeare wrote during the time of the plague and he wrote about plagues and about people being displaced from their homes and about how even when things are horrible, you can still find the goodness in them and find the fun aspects of life.

I think. Right now, it's nice to hear those words and to hear, read those stories about situations that kind of feel similar to what we're going through and how they worked through them and how we can work through them. I always think that in Shakespeare, there is always hope in every play and in every moment.

And even if I'm having a horrible day, I could pick up a play and be like, well, there's still someone at the end of this play, looking for hope and hoping for something better to change or doing something for that change. And I definitely think that right now, it's always nice to be reminded of that. When I go to work on a classical texts written 400 years before knowing any of this could have happened.

Michael Van Osch: Yeah. Yeah. Hope hallelujah. Absolutely. You know, well said as well. Well, I really appreciate speaking with you. I know you guys have to get to class, but, you know, I have a final question that I ask everybody that I interview and, Rosemary, why don't we start with you? And that question is if Shakespeare was on this zoom call with us and you got to ask him one question, what would you ask him?

Rosemary Armato: Oh gosh, I would ask him. One question.

I would ask him, can Mili go first?

Michael Van Osch: If you're ready, go for it.

Mili Koncelik: I would ask him; do you enjoy how your plays have reached an audience and help people work through things?

Michael Van Osch: Great question. Yeah. I'd like to know that too. All right. Rosemary time's ticking.

Rosemary Armato: Okay. So I would have a half question, which is that does Isabella go with him at the end of Measure for Measure?

I would also, I would ask him how, I mean. This man was able to write so many plays on top of all of the sonnets and the narrative poems. And he was just cranking out these plays and, and they're all beautiful. And they're so rich, the imagery and the characters. I mean, I can't, I can't emphasize enough how beautiful, I think his plays and his, just his words.

I can spend hours on a word. I would ask him, how, how did you do it? How did you do this many plays? If you had just written Romeo and Juliet, if you had just written Romeo and Juliet, you would be, I mean, a hero in my eyes, but you didn't, you wrote King Lear and wrote Othello and wrote Twelfth Night. And then I would ask him how, and also why?

Michael Van Osch: Yeah, I wish we could. I wish we could find out the answers to all your questions here cause they're fantastic. Well, thanks so much again, Rosemary and Mili, this has been great. Best of luck with the remaining school that you have there at Mary Baldwin University, I'll put the website and everything in the show notes for people so they can look up the university and look up your program.

Cause I know it's, it's a, it's such a great program and congrats for going this far in it. Best of luck with the graduation when it comes around in May and the future endeavors and let's stay in touch. That sounds great.

Rosemary Armato: Thank you

Michael Van Osch: All right. Thanks so much. Take care.

Shakespeare and Performing Arts Mary Baldwin University

Source: https://harkjournal.com/interview-mary-baldwin-university-mlitt-mfa-program/