Shakespeare Behind Bars

Aroview: Issues of redemption and reform underlie this strangely moving account of a troupe of male convicts in a Kentucky correctional facility who, over the course of a year, rehearse for a performance of Shakespeare's 'The Tempest'.

Initially, the efforts of the burly prisoners to master the Bard's baroque dialogue are laughably incongruous, but their apparent sincerity becomes more and more impressive and affecting. When we finally learn of the horrendous crimes for which they're in prison, questions as to the nature of their honesty, acting and artisitic identifications reveal ever-more complex dimensions. A non-patronising meditation on the modern problems of incarceration and timeless issues of redemption.

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