Posted by quinn
on May 29, 2009, 9:55 am
Message modified by board administrator May 31, 2009, 6:35 pm
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GERAINT WYN DAVIES ------- not dumbing it down
By Donal O'Connor STAFF REPORTER
Theatre is the bulwark against the dumbing down of acting that's being influenced by television "reality" shows, suggests Geraint Wyn Davies.
The versatile actor/director knows a thing or two about both acting worlds. Returning to Stratford for his sixth season, he plays the title role in Julius Caesar, Duncan in Macbeth and Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream.
The Welsh-born actor pulled out of theatre as a relatively young actor back in the 1970s to engage himself for about 10 years with the television series Forever Knight. Apart from playing the lead character Nick Knight, an 800-year old vampire/detective, he directed multiple episodes of the popular show along with episodes of Black Harbour, Pit Pony, Power Play and North of 60.
While television and film work have added to the variety, Mr. Wyn Davies acknowledges he thrives on, he is unreserved in his praise for the level of acting at Stratford. With more and more TV channels and too many reality shows "quality has almost dropped off the charts," he said of the medium that brought him a popular following outside of theatre.
The joy of theatre for him is in the standard of quality, he said. Although he left Wales for Canada with his parents at age seven, he has long maintained a deep connection to the place of his birth. His parents, incidentally, have returned to the old country where his father, Cerwyn, 81, is minister of a six-point charge in southwest Wales.
Mr. Wyn Davies not only shares the Swansea birthplace of Welsh poet Dylan Thomas but has been portraying the poet on stage in shows such as Dylan Thomas and Shakespeare: In the Envy of Some Greatness; Stranger in Paradise, and Do Not Go Gentle, written by former Stratford alumnus Leon Pownall.
"I truly enjoy the seasons the most when I can combine a comic role like Bottom and toss into the mix with the others," said the actor whose roles last season here included Polonius in Hamlet and King Ferdinand in "Fuente Ovejuna."
"This year I'm only going to do dying kings," he quipped, making light of the two rulers he is portraying this season and who are both assassinated.
"Caesar is a compact part but it packs a lot of punch," he adds, switching to a thoughtful note.
Given Mr. Wyn Davies' prolific work as a classical actor, it's almost surprising that he's tackling the role of Nick Bottom in Dream for the first time.
He was planning to "steal as much as I can" from the character that veteran actor Brian Bedford has put on stages here, he said. "Brian told me it's his part."
Still, Mr. Wyn Davies was cautious about approaching the role with a firm idea of how it should be played before hearing from director David Grindley.
"We don't know what David's got in mind. It's my turn to come up with something. But the context in which it is set informs how that will turn out."
The actor, who still has a following from his Forever Knight series, recalls fondly how, in working on one of the TV episodes, he was able to write in a fencing scene for which he called in acting pal Colm Feore and fight director John Stead from the Stratford Festival.
"It makes it really odd for the folks who know you as a vampire on television and you've actually been acting in classical theatre for your whole life.... But what's awesome about these folks who are fans is they all come to the theatre. They've been supporting the theatre since I finished that series 14 years ago."
After this season at the Festival he'll reprise Do Not Go Gentle on Broadway. He expects that will run to the end of January. "And then I'm going to go to a beach somewhere."
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