{"id":367082,"date":"2025-04-15T19:55:48","date_gmt":"2025-04-15T23:55:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/?p=367082"},"modified":"2025-04-15T19:55:48","modified_gmt":"2025-04-15T23:55:48","slug":"marcus-kyd-on-the-superpower-of-selflessness-in-beowulf-a-retelling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/2025\/04\/15\/marcus-kyd-on-the-superpower-of-selflessness-in-beowulf-a-retelling\/","title":{"rendered":"Marcus Kyd on the superpower of selflessness in ‘Beowulf, A Retelling’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Who knew that an ancient epic poem \u2014 the oldest surviving work of English literature \u2014 could come off as hyper-relevant to the epically treacherous moment we’re in? With the world premiere of Beowulf, A Retelling<\/em> \u2014 mounted in a cozy black box outfitted with tiny tables and a cash bar \u2014 Taffety Punk Theatre Company has delivered a performance experience of uncanny pertinence. Marcus Kyd, artistic director and co-founder of the company, freely adapted the text, and for about an hour and a half on stage solo, he transfixes us as Storyteller and a singer-musician. As soon as the show I saw was over, I knew I wanted to talk with him about what he had achieved, and he graciously made time for a conversation on Zoom, edited here for length and clarity.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Marcus Kyd as the Storyteller in \u2018Beowulf, A Retelling.\u2019 Photo by Chris Grady.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

John: I remember when you told me you were working on a one-man <\/b>Beowulf,<\/i><\/b> and I thought that sounded very intriguing, but also: <\/b>Beowulf!?<\/i><\/b> That Old English slog I read in freshman English!? Well, when I saw the show on its feet, I was knocked out. Here is an epic saga from 10 to 15 centuries ago, and you have retold it in a completely engrossing and approachable way, such that it plays like a parable for our times about political courage.<\/b><\/p>\n

Marcus:<\/b> Thank you. Really appreciate that. That was all the goal.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019d like to begin by exploring that breathtaking moment in your storytelling when Beowulf, having heard of the carnage wrought by a monster named Grendel, steps up to resist and fight back. Without hesitation, without agonizing over it, he says simply, \u201cI\u2019ll go.\u201d Would you talk about that moment?<\/b><\/p>\n

This is when we learn about the core of Beowulf\u2019s character. He is driven to help others. So in the show, the first time Beowulf says “I’ll go” is after he hears about the Grendel attack. Beowulf is always the person who says, \u201c I want to help.\u201d He’s a really selfless character.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

He says, Let’s go. Let’s do this. It’s the right thing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I am personally moved by Beowulf’s story, and it\u2019s these moments where, in rehearsal, occasionally I get choked up because of the weight of what’s happening.<\/span><\/p>\n

I want to talk about Grendel, this monster who had this absolutely insatiable and inhumane appetite. You and the director, Chris Curtis, have emphasized, in his words, that \u201cmonsters are real. And they hurt and kill people for real.\u201d Would you talk about how you depict the monster in the show and how you envision it in an era when CGI monster figures are commonplace?\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

In my mind, Grendel is an ogre, or like the cave troll in the <\/span>Lord of the Rings<\/span><\/i> movie when they’re stuck in Moria. In the original poem, the characters keep saying they don’t know what Grendel is and they don’t know where he’s from, but when they speak of him and his mother and their ilk, the characters also speak of ogres and trolls. We are told it takes four people to carry Grendel\u2019s head when it’s finally cut off. And he eats people.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shamelessly.<\/b><\/p>\n

Right, so what we decided to focus on was his size and his appetite.<\/span><\/p>\n

Not only are our imaginations familiar with fictional monsters in modern media, but there\u2019s a whole host of superheroes, each with some sort of superpower. But Beowulf seems dramatically different from your typical Marvel Comic action figure. He\u2019s very strong, and he goes it alone. He confronts the monster wearing no armor because he wants a fair fight. But his real superpower seems to be simply his readiness to prevent others from being harmed. And that, in my mind, counts as a superpower in this story.<\/b><\/p>\n

Absolutely. The mythic quality of his strength is there. I don’t think he’s Superman-strong or Jessica Jones\u2013strong, but he’s renowned to be stronger than most. But yes, I do think his superpower is his willingness to go and make the hard choices to help people, keep people from harm. He’s just thinking about other people all the time. Selflessness, maybe \u2014 I think that’s his superpower.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Love that idea. Selflessness is a superpower.<\/b><\/p>\n

I’ve been reading comic books for a long time, so I’m really excited that you say that. It’s one of the things I think we love about Wonder Woman, and something the first movie captured so well is that in addition to her superpowers, compassion is one of her greatest strengths.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Marcus Kyd as the Storyteller in \u2018Beowulf, A Retelling.\u2019 Photos by Chris Grady.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Your script is amazing. It sounds throughout like you are telling us, personally and in person, a totally absorbing story, in the moment, in your own words. There’s no off-stage authorial voice. Would you talk about the process of creating that immediacy?<\/b><\/p>\n

Thank you. It was a challenge because the original poem steers off into a lot of side quests very quickly, and there are a lot of archaic tribes and countries that nobody’s ever heard of anymore. So the first thing we did was ask ourselves, Okay, what is happening? We got a bunch of actors in the room, our dramaturg Tiffany [A. Bryant] was there, we had three translations out on the table, and we took turns reading from each. We’d take a passage, and we’d hear Tolkien’s translation, and then we’d hear [Maria Dahvana] Headley’s translation, then we’d hear [Seamus] Heaney\u2019s translation. And we would go back to one of the transcriptions of the original and be like, Okay, so what is actually happening?<\/span><\/p>\n

There are very difficult things in the poem to translate, and it sometimes goes off in weird directions. So that was step one: What is happening? Who to? Who were these people? During that first week, we made a list of things that actually scare us versus monsters that we might be fascinated with. We did that side by side because we were asking questions about what is a monster and is a monster worse than something that you fear \u2014 trying to get at Beowulf’s heroism, which is unfortunately rare. After that, it came down to me and Chris and Tiffany being in the room together and deciding what’s the best way to go through this. There are three big fights we had to set up. We had to show how bad the circumstances are and introduce our hero. Figuring out how to craft the script was a big challenge for me. Luckily, we had some time here at the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop, where I literally loc<\/span>ked myself in this room and started recording myself telling the story to no one in my own words.<\/span><\/p>\n

That so comes through, and it’s to us \u2014 a completely in-the-moment oral quality that’s just riveting.<\/b><\/p>\n

Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I love the concept of a mini mead hall. It’s like a dive bar or a comedy club where you might be sitting stageside at a little table next to someone you haven’t met yet. DC Theater Arts’ reviewer called<\/a> it \u201ca really fun night out,\u201d and it really is. Would you talk about how the play’s theme relates to such a social space?\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

There were a few reasons we chose to do it this way. One was Maria Headley’s translation. In her introduction, she suggests the poem sounds like somebody at a bar telling a story very loudly. So we really ran with that thought. Also, Seamus Heaney said the more he got to learn Old English while he was translating, the more it sounded to him<\/span> like the\u00a0\u201cbig voiced Scullions\u201d of his Irish family.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We don\u2019t want to interact with people like in an immersive play, but we do want to connect with them closely, hear their reactions. And I can then react to that stuff live, which is great. So putting the tables in, making sure that people could get drinks, made it feel a bit more like where we’re all from. A lot of the [Taffety Punk] company members grew up in the punk rock scene, where sometimes you’d go to a show and it wasn’t just bands; there would be somebody doing spoken word.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beowulf, A Retelling<\/em> had that spoken word quality.<\/b><\/p>\n

And that’s what we wanted to go for; we wanted it to feel intimate.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Your singing and guitar playing and Elijah Thomas\u2019 lighting design in that intimate black box have an outsize impact \u2014 there are some truly melodious troubador interludes and some genuinely jump-out-of-your seat lighting effects. There are also several vivid digressions, interpolations of contemporary heroism, which were fascinating in their own right but which also could be read as placeholders where any number of portraits in courage could be filled in.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

We started to ask, who are the heroes we know? And to not just say Aquaman, but to say, actually, there are real people fighting for good in our world, for a long time, and they don’t always win.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think this is a spoiler \u2014 the epic poem has been out there for quite some time \u2014 but in the end, Beowulf gives his life for the humanitarian cause he has embraced. In the course of the story, he bravely and singlehandedly vanquishes two monsters \u2014 Grendel and Grendel\u2019s vengeance-seeking mother, who\u2019s also a piece of work \u2014 but when Beowulf goes up against a third malicious monster, he is killed. If one is tracking the show as a parable about the importance of political courage, that\u2019s a grim and sobering ending. What do you make of it? Should Beowulf have stayed home and not got involved?<\/b><\/p>\n

Well, first of all, he couldn’t. That wouldn’t have been his nature.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beowulf strikes me as the kind of person who, even if his legs were cut off, would be crawling toward the fight on his hands. But what was important about that lesson for us was also \u2014 we say it in the show \u2014 there are going to be scars. If the fight is important, you’re not getting out of this without getting hurt.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I worry that we live in a time where there’s a lot of idealism \u2014 which I love; I’m an idealist myself. But if that idealism doesn’t include the reality that fights are hard and that you might get hurt fighting for what is right, be it trauma later or physical scars or just loss of any kind, then that idealism is foolish.<\/span><\/p>\n

This brings me to my last question, and it partly pivots on what I love about theater, which is that it can portray character vividly and deeply, the ethical core of a person. You said Beowulf wouldn’t dodge this fight. It’s not who he is. And your theater piece lifts that character \u2014 not just idiosyncratically but morally \u2014 up to our eyes to see and understand and relate to. With that in mind, how do you see the role, responsibility, and opportunity for theater in these dark times?<\/b><\/p>\n

I think our role doesn’t change. Our role has always been to ask the questions that exist between religion and psychology. There’s a void, I think, between religion and psychology where theater lives, and by presenting fictions, we get to engage with truths.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that’s the work. That’s our job. That’s what we do. I don’t believe that you have to worry about whether or not it’s ever the right time to tell a story. I think the story of Beowulf is always relevant. I think you could stage <\/span>Richard II <\/span><\/i>on any night in the last 400 years and forever into the future, and it would be relevant to what’s happening in the world. So I never worry about that. There’s going to be something in the story that’s relevant. If it’s a good story. Occasionally, a story suddenly becomes hyper-relevant, and that’s great. That’s a good moment to drive the art through. But what we do is put questions before the audiences and show potential answers, and most importantly, feel something about the result of those answers together. That’s the magic; that’s the power of theater. I could read an internet article about this big question, but experiencing it with 40 other people means we’ve just shared something. And what I want people to take away is that we had this event together, and we’re all leaving the room now maybe with more questions, maybe another answer, maybe a question about who we are.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
‘Beowulf’ poster art by Ryan Carroll Nelson.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Beowulf, A Retelling<\/strong><\/em><\/a> plays through April 19, 2025, presented by Taffety Punk Theatre Company, performing at the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop, 545 7th Street SE, Washington, DC. Performances are Wednesdays through Saturdays at 8:00 pm. Purchase tickets ($20 reserved seats at tables, $14 reserved riser seats) online.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Running Time: Approximately 90 minutes<\/p>\n

Beowulf, A Retelling
\n<\/em><\/strong>Freely adapted from the original poem by Marcus Kyd
\nDirected by Chris Curtis<\/p>\n

SEE ALSO:<\/strong>
\nTaffety Punk\u2019s \u2018Beowulf\u2019 reclaims the heroism we need to slay today\u2019s dragons <\/a><\/strong>(review by Deryl Davis, April 7, 2025)
\nTaffety Punk revamps \u2018Beowulf\u2019 as a barroom tale <\/a><\/strong>(news story, March 20, 2025)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The adapter and performer of Taffety Punk’s riveting world premiere talks about the hyper-relevance today of the oldest English lit. 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But he kept going to the theater, the art form that for him has always been the most transcendent and transporting and best illuminates the acts and ethics that connect us. He tweets at @JohnStoltenberg. 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He writes both reviews and his Magic Time! column, which he named after that magical moment between life and art just before a show begins. In it, he explores how art makes sense of life\u2014and vice versa\u2014as he reflects on meanings that matter in the theater he sees. Decades ago, in college, John began writing, producing, directing, and acting in plays. He continued through grad school\u2014earning an M.F.A. in theater arts from Columbia University School of the Arts\u2014then lucked into a job as writer-in-residence and administrative director with the influential experimental theater company The Open Theatre, whose legendary artistic director was Joseph Chaikin. Meanwhile, his own plays were produced off-off-Broadway, and he won a New York State Arts Council grant to write plays. Then John\u2019s life changed course: He turned to writing nonfiction essays, articles, and books and had a distinguished career as a magazine editor. But he kept going to the theater, the art form that for him has always been the most transcendent and transporting and best illuminates the acts and ethics that connect us. He tweets at @JohnStoltenberg. Member, American Theatre Critics\/Journalists Association.","url":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/author\/john-stoltenberg\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367082","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367082"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367082\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/372125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dctheaterarts.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}