GRANGER’S hallways are booming with so much talent that the spring play, Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night (or As You Will), had to double cast! “We had so much talent go through auditions, and it was going to be impossible to narrow it down because of how small this cast is,” Braxton Moore (11) said. Moore is the student director for Granger’s theatre program. “It was challenging because we had a lot of talent and it was hard to make a callback list because we could not call everyone back,” Moore said. He is very excited to take chances with a double cast, and work with director Jana Timpson and musical director Damien Kroger.

These students showed up as actors for the invite-only callback portion of the audition process. They were given parts of scenes to read as they were called up. “The people who received a callback made it one of the best callbacks I have ever seen as both a director, and someone who has been through that process as an actor so many times,” Moore said. 

Moore also mentioned that everyone who got up on stage really understood the Shakespearean language; he said that it is a hard language to understand and properly convey. Moore is a proud director and classmate. He says that he is most excited to teach play participants how to really understand the language of Shakespeare, especially in a play like this where there are a lot of context clues.

“When people think of theatre, they usually think of movies and not Shakespeare, but it is a very beautiful form of theatre, and once you do Shakespeare you can do anything,” Moore said.  These students really showed off the advanced theatre program’s depth of talent. Moore thinks his biggest struggle for being a student director will be being an authority figure, but also letting the main director take charge by staying off her toes. “I think it’s going to be really interesting to see each character portray their role; everyone has a different acting style, and it’s going to be awesome to see how the actors put their twist on these Shakespearean characters,” Moore said. 

Ms. Timpson did not go into the audition process with the intent of a double cast — it had crossed her mind before, but after seeing everyone give it their all, this just seemed like the best decision and the actors seemed to love the idea. 

“I’m excited to see how my ‘double’ is going to portray our character, Sir Toby Belch,” Dakota Sanches (12) said. Sanches says he needs to find a balance because he wants to be different from the other cast, but not too different because each cast still needs to work together. 

“I think a double cast was a very smart decision because there was a lot of talent involved, and it’s a small cast, so by splitting it into two, we get a lot more variety and opportunities for more people,” Brady Benson (12) said. Benson says that memorization is going to be his biggest hurdle since Shakespeare is very monologue heavy. 

Of course, there will inevitably be some talk and anxiety between the two casts, but with the directors and the students, they are confident that they can work together and be one hive mind of a team. Moore says, “Our casts are named William and Shakespeare, because we wanted to make both casts feel equal; there is no A or B cast, and there isn’t a cast one or cast two. We are all still one team. We are not picking favorites in anyway; these casts are both incredible, and we all have the same goal for success.” 

The Granger Theatre department enjoyed presenting this amazing show and running through a double cast for the first time.