From Page to Stage

The seventh grade drama course culminated this week with a spirited performance of Pericles, Prince of Tyre by William Shakespeare in Harris Theater. Throughout the year, the students have dedicated themselves to reading, understanding, analyzing, interpreting, and ultimately bringing Shakespeare’s work to life on stage, a challenge that they embraced with confidence. 

Each section of the class performed one of the play’s eight acts, with costumes and props providing continuity as different actors assumed the roles. In addition to learning Shakespeare’s language, seventh graders showed the work they have put into developing their theater skills this year, using physical, vocal, and emotional techniques to portray each character in an authentic and engaging manner.

At its core, Pericles, Prince of Tyre is a sweeping epic filled with adventure, love, and loss. The hero, Pericles, saves cities from famine, survives shipwrecks, triumphs in a knightly tournament, and endures the heartbreaking loss of his wife and daughter, only to be miraculously reunited with them sixteen years later through the divine intervention of the goddess Diana. With a rich cast of characters including royalty, assassins, fishermen, knights, love-struck ladies-in-waiting, a magician, a goddess, and even pirates, the seventh graders had no shortage of dramatic and colorful roles to immerse themselves in. 

To introduce the showcase, Director Adam Crescenzi set the stage for the audience, composed of Upper School students, friends, and families, by highlighting the significance of Pericles within Shakespeare’s body of work. He explained that the play belongs to Shakespeare’s “Later Romances,” a group of plays marked by similar themes. Adam invited the audience to watch for hallmark elements of this genre: a long-awaited family reunion, sea voyages, a lapse of time within the narrative, and a moment of supernatural or divine intervention that shifts the course of the story. Congratulations to the seventh grade actors on their outstanding performance, hard work, and dedication to bringing Shakespeare’s work to life on stage.