\u201cThe play is actually about the misuse of the law for political purposes. And [John] Lennon and Yoko Ono became targets of Nixon and his dishonest group of\u2026 whatevers. Nixon saw Lennon and his activism as a threat to his re-election because Lennon appealed to the young voters. And remember that the election coming up, then, was the first time that 18-year-olds got to vote in the States,\u201d says Dean. \u201cWe see all the stages that Lennon went through, which were really, really awful. It was a time of his life when The Beatles were not together, so he had outgrown his superstardom and he was really anxious to promote his high ideals. So, the playwright caught all these moods as they changed and in some scenes it’s really clear that probably Lennon was on cocaine at that time, and in another scene he\u2019s drowning his sorrows in rum.\u201d<\/p>\n Actor Nicholas Guerreiro strikes a remarkable resemblance to Lennon, but you might not have been able to tell at their rehearsals\u2014Dean says that masks made it difficult to judge the actors\u2019 expressions during rehearsal. They endured despite the challenges, however, and after two months of rehearsing on nights and weekends they did one performance, which went perfectly.<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t let them take their masks off until they had all had their second vaccinations,\u201d says Dean. \u201cAnd then we filmed the show, we videotaped it at Langham Court, who very kindly let us go on their stage. And Jason King [who also works in Camosun’s audio\/visual department] did the video. We only did a one-camera shoot because on Fringe you don\u2019t really make a lot of money and a three-camera shoot is like $2,500. So, he did a one-camera shoot, and I was so thrilled at how it came out. One take.\u201d<\/p>\n Like Dean, David Elendune also had to adapt his play for the pandemic. Elendune said that The Shadow in the Water<\/em> has been the most feedback-intensive piece he has ever written, first going to Langham Court, then The Belfry, and then through multiple workshops. And almost all of this was done over Zoom during the pandemic. The play also had to be shortened to comply with a 60-minute maximum length. And while The Shadow in the Water<\/em> is technically being performed live, it won\u2019t be the usual theatre-going experience.<\/p>\n \u201cThe play is designed to be done with a minimum of five actors if it was done as a normal play\u2014two people in the middle and then three people playing multiple roles,\u201d says Elendune. \u201cBut because of COVID we were like, okay, how many actors can we have? We don\u2019t know what it’s going to be six months down the line, so the decision was made to basically have the two people in ‘the now,’ which is 1969. The old lady, the person who\u2019s come to pick her up, and any of the flashbacks were filmed by Mike Byrne of Clock Tower Images. So that\u2019s all being edited as we speak. So, there\u2019ll be some scenes where it\u2019ll just be purely film, and there are some scenes where the live actors interact with pre-filmed stuff, flipping words back and forth.\u201d<\/p>\n Elendune has been working on this play for close to 18 months. And not long into the writing process his wife, Jane, got sick. She was eventually diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. From that point on, the play started in a new direction. He called it a \u201cmemory play\u201d similar in structure to the movie Titanic<\/em>. In the play, an elderly woman, who is being interviewed, looks back at her life and recalls her loss.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, obviously that\u2019s Jane in all but name. And this person throughout her life has lost three loves, so then you\u2019ve got this… How do you deal with grief? How do you deal with the loss of somebody? And in that way, I was writing about myself. Almost pre-grief, if you know what I mean, because I knew she was dying. So, I was writing about me at that time through this character but also me in the future. After somebody is gone, how do you rebuild but also honour their life?\u201d<\/p>\n Elendune says that writing this play helped him to escape. It gave him somewhere to channel his emotions. He says that until now he has written mostly with his head, but this one came from his heart.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re gonna get what you think you\u2019ve come in for, but not in the way you think you were gonna get it,\u201d says Elendune. \u201cThere\u2019s always a twist in the tale with me. This is a play that\u2019s been sold on sharks. And there\u2019s sharks in it but, actually, to be honest, it\u2019s a play about grief.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/Shadow-Green-Screen-Oar.jpg\")
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