APRIL 10–12, 2023
James Bundy, Elizabeth Parker Ware Dean
Florie Seery, Associate Dean
Chantal Rodriguez, Associate Dean
Carla L. Jackson, Assistant Dean
for the honey, you gotta say
written by Christopher Bayes and the Company
conceived and directed by Christopher Bayes
Creative Team
Music Director
Michael Joseph McQuilken
Production Dramaturg
Shyama Iyer
Stage Manager
Josie Cooper
the Company
Anthony Grace
Samuel DeMuria
Shimali De Silva
Tavia Hunt
Maggie McCaffery
Nomè SiDone
Abigail C. Onwunali
yao
for the honey, you gotta say when. is performed without an intermission.
Content Guidance
Any content you may find offensive was created and insisted upon by the company.
This production is supported by The Benjamin Mordecai III Production Fund.
Production:
Associate Safety Advisor
Aholibama Castañeda González
Associate Production Manager
Cian Jaspar Freeman
Run Crew
Micah Ohno, Doug Robinson
Administration
Associate Managing Director
Matthew Sonnenfeld
Assistant Managing Director
Natalie King
Management Assistants
Roman Sanchez
Mikayla Stanley
House Manager
Natalie King
Production Photographer
Maza Rey
Special Thanks
Annie, E and Cosmo; Tojo; Jen McClure
Yale University acknowledges that Indigenous peoples and nations, including Mohegan, Mashantucket Pequot, Eastern Pequot, Schaghticoke, Golden Hill Paugussett, Niantic, and the Quinnipiac and other Algonquian speaking peoples, have stewarded through generations the lands and waterways of what is now the state of Connecticut. We honor and respect the enduring and continuing relationship that exists between these peoples and nations and this land.
The Studio Productions are designed to be learning experiences that complement classroom work, providing a medium for students at David Geffen School of Drama at Yale to combine their individual talents and energies toward the staging of collaboratively created works. Your attendance meaningfully completes this process.
FUND, established by a graduate of the School, honors the memory of the Tony Award-winning producer who served as Managing Director of Yale Repertory Theatre, 1982–1993, and as Associate Dean and Chair of the Theater Management Program from 1993 until his death in 2005.
All patrons must wear masks at all times while inside the theater except when eating or drinking. Our staff, backstage crew, and artists will also be masked at all times.
The taking of photographs or the use of recording devices of any kind in the theater without the written permission of the management is prohibited.
David Geffen School of Drama productions are supported by the work of more than 200 faculty and staff members throughout the year.
Commedia dell’Arte is a 16th-century Italian form of improvised theater that uses masks, stock characters, and physical comedy to bring to life a rambunctious world. Unlike in traditional plays, the actors here play diverse roles in the creation of the project, and, indeed, this year what you will see was largely conceived, written, and choreographed by members of the David Geffen School of Drama’s class of 2023. Their piece—for the honey, you gotta say when.—takes the conventions of commedia out of 16th-century Italy and places it firmly in our present moment. Having navigated a complicated four years in a three-year program, and caught between the clutches of the COVID-19 pandemic and social and political turmoil, the production also brings to life the actors’ unique struggles. To address these struggles, they devised lists, sang songs, laughed incessantly, and finally arrived at the production you will see today.
Inhabiting the stage are bright traditional characters like Brighella—a quick-witted wrangler, Pantalone—a covetous old man, Smeraldina—a chatty servant, Tartaglia—a dainty young thing, Pulcinella—the pizza guy, and several zannis—extra characters with bumbling personalities. All these characters use their odd, and sometimes counterintuitive, capabilities to find inconsistencies, new realities, and to pose some very probing, very current questions: questions about your insides, about your love life, about your temperature, about your language, and about how you like to drink your tea (hopefully with honey?). To the best of their often dubious ability, they navigate racial stereotyping, white privilege, gender binaries, and American politics. They try and fail, and try again, to understand the confusing world that keeps falling apart around them.
These characters don’t always have the answers to the questions they ask, but one thing is for sure, they come from a place of honesty; for although the mask covers the actor’s face, it tends to reveal a deeper, childlike spirit—unafraid of judgment and overwhelmingly free.
—Shyama Iyer, Production Dramaturg