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“So what kinds of reactions did your students have to the film?”

This was the first question from Curt L. Tofteland, director of Kentucky Shakespeare Festival and Shakespeare Behind Bars, after he picked me up from my hotel to head to the Monday, April 14^th rehearsal.

They had reacted in myriad ways, and with broadly divergent thoughts, but what stood foremost in my mind was their initial reaction, which is said to be the most honest.

About 40 minutes into the film, Leonard, one of the troupe members, is suddenly sent to the “hole” (solitary confinement), allegedly for a violation of the computer policy. In a brief interview segment, the filmmaker is heard asking Leonard, “So why are you here?” There is a pause of some 20 seconds, during which landscapes of emotion cross Leonard’s face. He finally answers, “I sexually molested seven girls.” Choking with emotion, he continues, “It’s the worst thing I’ve ever done,” and says that he hopes to be able to conduct a meaningful life, somehow balancing the scales, “so that I’m not remembered for the very worst thing I’ve ever done.”

Immediately following this confession, the bell ending the class period was about to ring and I asked my students what they thought of the film so far. Some of them stared forward, some of them looked at me, some shifted uncomfortably in their seats—but none answered. And this wasn’t adolescent indifference; what they had seen had impacted them, maybe even changed them, and they were still processing it. It was a powerful moment for me to witness, and I told Curt about it.

Curt then gave me some background about this scene, which led to a lengthy dialogue about both the documentary film and the program. The filmmakers had been instructed not to ask the troupe members about their crimes. “Nobody talks about their crimes in prison,” Curt explained, and yet the confessions of Hal, Sammie, and Big G had come tumbling out spontaneously on camera.

When Leonard was sent to the hole, disrupting the play’s rehearsals and necessitating that his role be recast, the film crew received special permission to talk with Leonard despite the fact that prisoners in solitary confinement are typically allowed no visitors. (Curt also explained that sex offenders occupy the lowest rung in the inmate hierarchy; cop killers, the highest: indeed, one can hear the other prisoners in “the hole” heckling Leonard in strong terms about pedophilia.)

When the filmmaker asks Leonard in the course of their interview, “So why are you here,” he is actually asking what Leonard has done to be placed in solitary confinement. “Leonard had never talked about his crime, never taken responsibility for what he had done,” Curt told me, “but he was just ready.” He answered the question in its larger sense—why is he in prison—and the results are spellbinding.

Having completed the sex offender program, Leonard had high hopes that his parole would be granted and his 50-year sentence reduced at his recent hearing. Instead, according to Curt, he got a 10-year “flop” (deferment, or extended sentence), which means that he will not be released until he is at least in his late 50s. As a result, Leonard withdrew from prison life, leaving the Shakespeare Behind Bars program (Curt insists on referring to it as a “vacation” when an inmate leaves the program, always leaving the door open for his eventual return). Since then he’s become involved with Luckett’s TV studio and has shown signs of reengaging with constructive programs, so there’s hope he’ll come back to Shakespeare.

Curt then talked a bit about how Shakespeare Behind Bars (SBB) is funded: it has been a condition of his involvement since he founded the program in 1995 that it should never be dependent on tax dollars. He said he periodically receives phone calls from citizens who are angry that their tax money is going to such a program for prisoners. His first response is that the program is free; his second is that he doesn’t really approve of the fact that his tax dollars are being used to fight a war, but he has little say in the matter. This usually ends the conversation rather quickly.

Recently, though, he couldn’t pass up an opportunity to expand upon some of the program’s goals through the facilitation of a $25,000 National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grant. With the funds, he’s continues to be part of the SBB program and restaging the play Julius Caesar at the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex (LLCC); the festival’s education director, Pamela DiPasquale is directing an abridged version of Caesar with professional actors that will tour schools in the area. In addition, an actor/director who works often with Kentucky Shakespeare Festival, Matt Wallace, is conducting a Shakespeare’s Studio Artist Residency with troubled youths ages 15-17 at the Audubon Youth Development Center; they’re also studying and staging sections of Caesar. The teens visited LLCC in March to witness the inmates running scenes and ask questions of them; this week, the students in the Audubon program will return to LLCC to perform a few scenes and share what the program has meant to them.

As we reached the end of our 20-minute drive northeast from Louisville to La Grange and turned in to the prison’s long driveway, Curt told me about some of the rhythms and procedures of entering the prison and what to expect when entering the site of the rehearsal. (When speaking of SBB’s participants, Curt consistently refers to them as “my guys,” which serves to underscore his devotion to these men and his unwavering belief in the value of the program.)

Luther Luckett was built fairly recently (about 25 years ago), so it’s set up more like an office park than a prison: no clanging gates, no towering walls, no imposing architecture. Still, I was reminded I was entering a prison when Curt told me to bring only a photo identification and my notebook, leaving my phone, wallet, keys, and all other personal effects in the car. When we entered, we had to remove our jackets and place them on a conveyor which led them through an x-ray machine, then each sidle through a free-standing metal detector. There’s something eerie and rather sobering about watching your jacket and notebook and they are dragged through the unit—and seeing only the zipper and buttons along with the metal parts of my fancy pen. I surrendered my driver’s license and was handed a badge I was to wear at all times inside the prison, showing it to guards at various stations along our way. As Curt pointed out, my official identity was now “Visitor 3” for the duration of my visit. Matt Wallace, the artist-in-residence mentioned above and presumably the man who will take over SBB (at least on an interim basis) when Curt retires next year, joined us as well to observe the rehearsal.

Curt introduced me to the guards and staff members he knows well, so I didn’t feel out of place for long. The chaplain, Marc Wessels, went to Lancaster Theological Seminary and is familiar with this area, so we exchanged a bit of small talk about this coincidence. We entered the chapel, where the rehearsal would be taking place during both days of my visit (in the film, rehearsals seem to be held in multiple locations, including a portion of the athletic facilities and the canteen). 

Inside we found some 23 men, all clad head-to-toe in khaki (the prison uniform; I had been cautioned not to wear any khaki-colored clothing during my visit), milling about, waiting for rehearsal to begin.

The sight took my breath away: I was finally here.

Scanning the faces of the inmates, my eyes rested on those I recognized from the film: there was Floyd Vaughn; there was Howard, who was denied parole during the filming and in a heartbreaking scene said he was most upset about having to call his family and break the news to them; there was a bespectacled, larger-than-life Jerry “Big G” Guenthner; there was Hal, who played Prospero in The Tempest as shown in the documentary and offered meaningful reflections on his crime; there was Ron, who memorably clashed with Hal during a rehearsal scene in the film. Mostly, though, there were new faces, and each seemed genuinely pleased that I was there. Within ten minutes of my arrival, Vaughn, Ron, Mike, Hal, and a few others had all introduced themselves, asked where I was from, and thanked me for coming to visit.

[The above picture was taken by Curt Tofteland and is from a previous year's performance.  Front row, far left: Hal; fourth, fifth, and sixth from left are Leonard, Ron, and Louis. Back row, far left: Vaughn; second from left: Big G.]

I think the troupe member who made the profoundest impact on me was Ron, though I had memorable exchanges with others as well. When Curt introduced us and said I was from Pennsylvania, without missing a beat Ron asked, “Clinton or Obama?” My response (the latter) elicited a strong handshake and approving slap on the back—though Ron was quick to add that Obama had not gotten his support simply because they share the same skin color: “I listened to what Obama had to say, studied Hillary,” but he said he ultimately was turned off by her campaign tactics. When I agreed that this troubled me as well, he offered an appreciative, “That what I’m talkin’ about.”

As Curt entered the rehearsal space (and I positioned myself on the relative periphery of the circle), the men gradually left their private conversations and took their seats. Curt began by asking me to introduce myself and talk about why I was there; I did so and noted that I was excited about learning from them, keeping my comments (unlike my writing) brief. Curt opened the meeting by telling them that over the past weekend, one of the actors he’d hired to take part in the above-mentioned Caesar program was arrested for his second DUI. Curt told of how, prior to offering him the job, he’d asked the actor, an Iraq war veteran, if he was dealing well with his experiences in combat. The actor had answered that he was fine, but clearly he was seeking to dull the pain of his post-traumatic stress disorder with alcohol. The results of his actions: if convicted, he might serve some jail time; he has disappointed those who were there to help him (including Curt) but whose help he refused; and he has grossly inconvenienced the members of Curt’s troupe—and most specifically Curt, who now must find a new actor to step into the role with less than two weeks to go.

The undercurrent of Curt’s comments was unmistakable—that the mistakes we make have consequences that reach far beyond our own individual regrets, and that it is essential to ask for help when we think we may need it—but it was a message delivered smoothly, without heavy-handedness or pedantry.

Ron, who is one of the long-time members of SBB, spoke up and disagreed with some of what Curt said. “People in those situations think they have certain things under control,” he said, but in reality they continue to struggle to maintain that control. There are grey areas that we must respect, Ron insisted, because “some people are quick to make black-and-white determinations about right and wrong.” We must acknowledge the power of a disease like alcoholism, for example, rather than placing the blame on the actor for having failed to ask for help when he felt he was doing well.

Curt countered by saying that “change and responsibility begins in one place—and that is with the individual.” Change must be profound and resolute. To further illustrate his point, Curt brought up the case of Ricky, a participant in SBB who appears in the film; in figuring out how to endure a sentence of “two lifes without” (a double life sentence without possibility of parole), Rick decides to join SBB. “I’ve never finished anything in my life,” he says, so he’s determined to do this, and do it well.

Rick has been mentored into the program by Big G; new participants must be recommended by an existing member, have one year clear conduct, and must stay out of trouble or they will be unable to continue. Rick makes the unfortunate choice to get a tattoo in prison in violation of the rules, and landed in the hole, disqualifying him from being in SBB. Following the filming, Rick was transferred to another prison, the Kentucky State Reformatory, and after several months hanged himself with his shoelaces.

“Ricky slipped through the net,” Curt said, emphasizing the fact that he had a support network in SBB but declined to ask for help when he needed it, “but it was his choice.”

It was a fascinating conversation about whether we (as individuals, as a society) can focus on the need to ascribe and accept personal responsibility for our actions without sitting in condescending judgment of one another’s flaws and foibles. I had been there for ten minutes, and already I was in the midst of one of the most compelling philosophical exchanges of my life.

“What does Brutus say before he leaves the stage?” Curt asked Big G, who is playing the role.

“O that a man might know / The end of this day’s business ere it come,” G flawlessly recited from Act 5, scene 1. How will we handle the problems with which we will invariably be faced each day? Will be make it through unscathed? I am struck here with empathy, but it’s almost deeper than that: I can see myself in these men. This is not to say that I expect to commit murder or armed robbery or felony assault; it’s simply to suggest that these men are not substantively different from me, from any of us. They made mistakes, miscalculations; they lost control; they made poor choices. Their crimes don’t make them monsters, as the simplest among us might dismissively conclude. Their crimes make them human.

The discussion wraps up with a consideration of the ways in which men’s egos tend to prevent them from asking for—or accepting—the help we need. “People go out of their way to help, but we say, ‘Oh, I know what I’m doing,’” one inmate said. “Well, I didn’t know frickin’ squat, ‘cause now I’m sittin’ in this fuckin’ place.”

Curt seamlessly transitions from this discussion into the material, encouraging the men to find themselves in their roles. It’s time for the warm-up exercises, and I notice immediately the warmth that dominates Curt’s interactions with the men, and their interactions with one another. He’s also very physical with “his guys,” slapping them on the back in encouragement and greeting. It is unusual (and refreshing) to see men so comfortable with one another physically.

The warm-up scene in the film was one of my students’ favorite, partially because a few of them are actors, but mostly because it made them marvel at how a group of inmates threw themselves body and soul into the craft of acting.

First up is “Zip Zap Zop” (though I think they were saying “Zip Zap Zoh” here), a traditional acting exercise in which the men stand in a circle and “send” the energy across and around to the other men. One man claps crisply, makes eye contact with someone else in the circle, and “passes” the sound to him by directing his hand toward the receiver. It’s a drill that emphasizes clear expression, swift reaction, full engagement, careful listening and communication, and impeccable timing.

Then the men go around the circle reciting a monologue from Julius Caesar they had been given by Curt to memorize over the summer. It’s Antony’s soliloquy from the end of Act 3, scene 1, after he discovers his friend Caesar’s body and then shakes the bloody hands of the conspirators:

O, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth,
That I am meek and gentle with these butchers!
Thou art the ruins of the noblest man
That ever lived in the tide of times.
Woe to the hand that shed this costly blood!
Over thy wounds now do I prophesy,--
Which, like dumb mouths, do ope their ruby lips,
To beg the voice and utterance of my tongue--
A curse shall light upon the limbs of men;
Domestic fury and fierce civil strife
Shall cumber all the parts of Italy;
Blood and destruction shall be so in use
And dreadful objects so familiar
That mothers shall but smile when they behold
Their infants quarter’d with the hands of war;
All pity choked with custom of fell deeds:
And Caesar’s spirit, ranging for revenge,
With Ate by his side come hot from hell,
Shall in these confines with a monarch's voice
Cry ‘Havoc,’ and let slip the dogs of war;
That this foul deed shall smell above the earth
With carrion men, groaning for burial.

Here again, it’s the importance of eye contact, of communal pursuit—the circle breaks down, after all, if someone forgets the next word and must repeat the previous one—being emphasized with this exercise.

As the warm-up exercises die down and the men gear up for the rehearsal of a portion of the play, Ron came over and chats with me for a bit; this would be the first of several conversations over the course of my two-day visit, and I found him to be a most fascinating individual.

TO BE CONTINUED IN PART FOUR.