When you hear their voice

Correction and Instruction must both work ‘ere the rude beast be tamed
Measure for Measure, William Shakespeare.

I had initially come to Malta to present as part of a European Prisons Education Association (EPEA) Conference. For my own part I would lead an interactive ‘Shakespeare Workout’ within the Corradino Correctional Facility’s Young Offender’s Unit.

There could, of course, be no way of knowing that this simple act – one I had undertaken globally hundreds of times before – would here lead to a virtual guide book for international good practice. But it did.

Why? For me, it will always be primarily due to the determined commitment of the young men. Never have I ever worked inside such a committed team. Team work is, of course, not something globally celebrated within prisons. Often a culture of isolation persists. These lads broke those bounds. They did so legally and with just pride. “If you’re good, then I’ll be good too,” Jose’s would shout as a rallying call.

There was, also, something rare: Joanne Battistino, the Director of Operations. This is a woman whose heart opens both minds and souls where doors are so frequently slammed shut. Hers is by no means a perfect world – very far from it – but still a world sincerely seeded in a baseline of hope. That hope is, in fact, why this situation was different; why she deserves to stand out as a global role-model.

Making up this particular international ‘band of brothers’ were two lads from Britain; two from the USA (one a New Jersey native whose partner had only recently given birth to his first child); a gloriously talented Estonian boy (“My name is Aulis and I am an actor”); a young Portuguese man; one from Ethiopia; and a 19-year-old Spanish boy who initially spoke not a word of “Ingles” but proudly finished celebrating the fact he could “even joke in English now”.

Later they’d say I changed their lives. I hadn’t. Shakespeare and their own determination had. They had themselves become engaged.

We would, I proffered, concoct a theatrical presentation enveloping the multi-national cultures there-in indoctrinated. This would be created inside the prison but performed in a professional theatre outside, to show full vocational achievement. Additionally it would be filmed as part of a documentary for global distribution so that posterity itself might have a chance to benefit and listen.

WHEN YOU HEAR MY VOICE theatrically championed Shakespeare and other motivational forces in a vast multitude of tongues. Thus it was that our work celebrated the global redemptive power of literacy within its two-act, two-hour traffic of the stage.

Music was an interactive character, as we now know it had been in Shakespeare’s own theatre. Fifteen songs were wrought from the collected imagination of five young British composers and sewn into a theatrical union with lyrics drawn from such pens as those of Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth I, Noel Coward, Tennessee Williams, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Eric Bogle and a host of others, alongside a selection from a large canon of original offender, ex-offender and outsider writings. All had been inspired by the Bard and inscribed within global LSW workshops.

These lads knew they were privileged to share their new-found professional acumen within the relative splendour of Valletta’s St. James Cavalier Theatre. They did so proudly. And in front of their ultimate stake holders: the Maltese tax payer. The President of Malta even attended one performance. At the end of every performance the audience rose in celebratory salute to the fine theatrical work they had just witnessed.

Never before had the St. James Cavalier sold out during a week night. WHEN YOU HEAR MY VOICE did so on the occasion of each of its four performances. Thus, our production itself made a slice of independent theatrical history; one which I’m confident will stand alone, far beyond any prison or judicial precedent.

It seemed that every person present was able to proactively see a return on their initial investment. Perhaps this was because these lads were, as I told them they needed to be, ‘better than good’. They had, after all, to change minds. Any actor worth their salt knows what that feels like. Moreover, they had to do so with a commitment sufficient to transport and delight that audience as much as themselves. Had they not done so they would’ve been merely ‘worthy’ and deservedly soon forgot. That deadly mark of ‘worthiness’ is all too oft pinned onto a vast plethora of unworthy lapels. These lads, however, earned their respect fairly. That is why, I believe, they will be remembered.

Shakespeare – through his own celebration of our universal community – is our greatest leveller. These lads had stood his test. For them this was and will remain freedom.

The one review I will always cherish from this enterprise was delivered in the form of a card written by one young offender’s mother: “Thank you so very much for turning him into a good man.”

The reality of their detailed and skilful hunger is not often felt in our theatre. The reason for that lies, I believe, in the fact that it can only thrive in that rarefied space Williams defines as being “between the bed and the chair”. It must be dangerous; it must breathe adversity. That remit is not always an easy one to replicate. Some places are just too safe for real theatrical significance to inspire.

Here, for a brief but magical moment, these young men allowed themselves (and therefore the rest of us) to forget that we, too, might be imprisoned in our own minds.

‘The guys’ (as I’m all too fond of calling them) held, as ‘t’were, Shakespeare’s mirror up to a more substantive nature. As one review had it: They were “Raising men to the divine” and as another proclaimed, they did so “Straight to the heart”.

“I’m glad I got arrested,” Solomon said. “It gave me a chance to do this.”

As FDR instructed: There is nothing to fear but fear itself. It only takes one person; one caring, brave person with a vision and, more significantly, a commitment to that vision – a person like the extraordinary Joanne Battistino – to realise as meaningful an endeavour as this. Such bravery needs to be cherished.

As Sir Alec Guinness explained to me when I was but a young actor: “Fear, boy, is, after all, only three quarters excitement.”

If it be thus to dream, still let me sleep.