Mario Mercado as Cinna the Poet (center) wards off the crowd in “Shakespeare on Shakespeare,” performed by professor emerita Irene Nunnari’s English 307 class on February 29.
The students of Irene Nunnari, professor emerita of arts and letters at Mount Saint Mary College, recently discovered that one of the best ways to learn Shakespeare is to live it.
With teachers, friends, and family in attendance, the class of 10 performed sonnets and scenes from The Bard’s comedies, tragedies, and history plays, including “Cinna the Poet” from Julius Caesar, “The English Lesson” from Henry V, and “The Three Witches” from Macbeth. They also performed musical solos and speeches from Hamlet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Much Ado About Nothing.
Nunnari retired in 2009, but continued teaching the accelerated ENG 307 course at the college in the spring semester. The class is a requirement for Mount English majors and, notes Nunnari, many of the students are also taking the education track.
Inspired by the notion that “One little scene alive is worth more than a whole play dead” (J.L. Styan), Nunnari has made live performance a centerpiece in her classroom for 25 years, she said.
“I feel that students don't really know Shakespeare until they have spoken it or seen it live,” she explained. “They directly experience the emotion of the lines as well as reactions from a live audience.
Over the course of 50 years Nunnari taught thousands of students at the Mount in public speaking, theater, and more. She earned a bachelor’s degree in drama from Marywood University, a master’s in English from SUNY New Paltz, a master’s in theatre arts from Villanova University, and a doctoral degree of educational theatre from New York University.
Left to right: Melissa Houle of Wappingers Falls, N.Y.; Alec Rosenberger of Pine Bush, N.Y.; Georgia Fountain of Peekskill, N.Y.; Mario Mercado of Poughkeepsie, N.Y.; Kaitlyn Bernard of Poughkeepsie, N.Y.; visitor Lynn Thomsen of Germany, Kerry Francis of Montgomery, N.Y. and Dylan Goerg of Hopewell Junction, N.Y. perform “Shakespeare on Shakespeare” on February 29 at Mount Saint Mary College.