Roles & Contributions

Ani's primary focus was on the early productions of Shakespeare Santa Cruz's A Midsummer Night's Dream. 

• Ani spent the Winter Quarter and much of Spring Quarter going through the archival material on the early productions of Dream at Special Collections in McHenry Library. She digitized and catalogued all of the relevant information in a shared Google Drive. 

• After perusing the files pertaining to her assigned years, Ani spent around three weeks writing and editing a production history of Dream. The production history blended together the efforts to put on the plays, the performances themselves, and their reception by the community. 

This experience has solidified Ani's appreciation for archival research. She believes that local histories are integral to the fabric of society at large; the local history of Santa Cruz is especially integral to the university. She learned about Shakespeare Santa Cruz and its impact on university-town relations. Her love and respect for the arts multiplied throughout the internship because- through the archives- she witnessed its importance for the Santa Cruz community, UCSC students and faculty, and for keeping the words of the Bard alive.

Emma's primary responsibilities included researching both past productions of Shakespeare's Pericles and musical theatre productions at Shakespeare Santa Cruz. She used her research to write production histories for Santa Cruz Shakespeare's summer program.

• Emma has spent the last six months going through ephemera related to Pericles and musicals from the Shakespeare Santa Cruz archive at the McHenry Library, as well as researching the critical reception of different productions online and interviewing some of the members of SSC who were involved with producing them.

• Emma's research culminated in two production histories. Because SSC has only staged Pericles once before, its production history primarily focused on the production's creative choices and how those choices addressed ambiguous elements in the text. Because SSC has a history of staging original musicals, in addition to Broadway blockbusters, Emma instead chose to focus on the story of how those musicals came to be and their impact on SSC's community.

This project has given Emma deeper insight into how a relationship between the academy and the theatre can lead to a deeper appreciation for Shakespeare’s plays. She is convinced that the love for Shakespeare that Shakespeare Santa Cruz has fostered in its community has made Santa Cruz a very special place.

Stone’s primary responsibility was to compile research of the production history of Shakespeare Santa Cruz’s 2001 and 2009 performances of A Midsummer Night Dream, with some minor research into Santa Cruz Shakespeare’s 2016 performance. This research developed into a written report of Stone’s findings from the archive, eventually being reworked into a more complete production history. 

• Through the end of Winter Quarter and to the end of Spring Quarter, Stone explored the Shakespeare Santa Cruz archives at McHenry Library’s Special Collections, watching recordings of the performances and finding director’s notes, photos, and material giving insight into these productions of Dream. Stone would also look at contemporary reviews to understand how audiences received these performances at the time. 

• Stone’s production history elaborates on the shared themes the 2001 and 2009 productions have with their predecessors while still being originally reexamined by their directors to respond to the contemporary moment. This production history also establishes how Dream showcases the lineage of Shakespeare Santa Cruz to Santa Cruz Shakespeare. Stone would emphasize these observations by analyzing the artistic decisions of the costume designer, set designers, and the cast’s characterization. 

This experience has given Stone an admiration for the ways in which Shakespeare's stories have enriched the Santa Cruz community by creating unity and tradition. Stone feels honored to preserve and participate in the longstanding artistic endeavors Santa Cruz Shakespeare engages with Santa Cruz residents. As a Humanities student, Stone believes storytelling, especially Shakespeare, can authentically encourage others to reimagine what is possible for themselves and for society.