Fatal Attraction
1. The issue of length
2. Character complications
a) fleshing out personalities
b) conflating characters
3. Making the play Relevant to Modern Audience
4. Picking a Modern Theme
a) 80s lingo
b) How to be pertinent/relatable?
5. Plot
a) creating a more concrete world
6. Language Shifts
a) Modern English vs. Middle English
1. The issue of length
The most obvious problem we faced was taking an original 100 page script of
Middle English writing and converting it to a 30-40 page script with modernday English. It was imperative that we simplified the plot, from cutting
characters and scenes to simplifying speeches and shortening scenes
altogether. By doing so, we were able to simplify and condense the plot, making
it more basic and easier to follow, as well as fitting into our time constraint.
2. Character complications
a) fleshing out personalities
Several of the characters in The Castle of Perseverance showed similar personality
traits. Vices like Envy and Greed were hard to distinguish, as well as their
similarity to Backbiter. The Virtues were also remarkably alike, and in order
to separate Abstinence and Chastity we had to focus on sexual abstinence
and overeating. We tried to create lines showing at least one aspect of each
character that differed from others, and to overlook any traits they might
share
b) conflating characters
Since there were far too many characters for our class, we choose to combine
characters that were unnecessary and wouldn't be understood by modern
audiences anyways. For instance, World, Flesh, and Belial were originally
going to be combined into Belial, but we ended up scrapping them all
completely to have Demona and Backbiter, who already were very similar to
Belial, represent the same features. Likewise, Shrift and Penitence were
combined into Conscience, which is better understood by a wide audience
instead of just Roman Catholics.
3. Making the play Relevant to Modern Audience
We used similar techniques to the medieval playwrights in
making the subject of our play relatable to our audience.
The medieval writers of The Second Shepherd’s Pageant
gave their shepherds universal complaints about food,
family life, and the weather, as well as specific
complaints about the government practices at the time in
order to make the characters realistic and relevant to their
audience. By setting our adaptation in a high school, we
were able to incorporate aspects of modern life that our
audience could relate to, such as the choice of where to sit
at lunch, problems with authority in the form of teachers
and principles, cafeteria food, and general teen angst.
4. Picking a Modern Theme
a) 80s lingo
In order to develop language specific to the style, we rewatched a lot of these
movies ("Sixteen Candles", "Fast Times at Ridgemont High", etc.) and also
found a 80's slang dictionary online.
a) How to be pertinent/relatable?
We chose to write the script in the style of 80's high school movies like "The
Breakfast Club" because the archetypal characters in these movies reminded
us of the allegorical character types in morality plays. Also, these are images
that are easily recognized by the majority of our target audience. The
characters in "The Breakfast Club" matched particularly seemed to represent
several of the vices and virtues: Molly Ringwald's princess character
reminded us of "pride" but also "chastity"; Judd Nelson's rebel character
seemed to embrace "envy"; Anthony Michael Hall's brain character is a
strong example of "industry"; while Emilio Estevez's jock wrestler represented
"greed". Ally Sheedy's basketcase character didn't fit in as well, but could be
applied to the "lust" allegory.
5. Plot
a) creating a more concrete world
The setting of The Castle of Perseverance is in this abstract
world where physical reality does not really exist. We
chose to set the play in a concrete physical setting (a high
school classroom and cafeteria) that our audience could
understand. In the original play, Mankind’s soul faces
judgment, but we needed to create a judgment scene that
would fit in the context of our adaptation. By having
Manny brought up on drug charges, we were able to
portray a judgment scene in the context of our 80’s high
school theme.
6. Language Shifts
a) Modern English vs. Middle English
The shift from Middle English to Modern English was not an easy one. In order
to translate the original version into our new version, we had to carefully read
through the original Middle English text as well as an 85-page translated
version, which was easier to read than the original, but not entirely, and
translate the texts line by line. We gathered together the basic outline of each
of the characters' speeches and from there rewrote the lines into contemporary
English, adding 80s words and lingo along the way to conform with our 80s
theme. We decided to set the first scene in a Medieval Drama classroom as a
way to allow us to include short bits from the original "Banns" and from
there segueing into the modern world.