Jimonn Cole, a teaching artist from The Acting Company, helped students in the Upper School Shakespeare English elective gain a better understanding of Shakespeare play during the week of Jan. 14-17. Cole also went with students on a school field trip to The Acting Company’s production of As You Like It, a play which the class is currently reading, on the evening of Jan. 16.

“I’m looking forward to gain an acting perspective on Shakespeare’s plays,” junior Michael Wilkens, a student in the class, said the week before Cole arrived. Wilkens, an actor himself, had participated in the US production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream last fall.

Senior Maddie Graham agrees with Wilkens. “…In understanding Shakespeare it is important to see how it is acted out properly so having an actor come in is helpful in understanding how it is to be acted rather than just read,” Graham said.

Cole also came to St. Paul Academy and Summit School two years ago to do activities with the Shakespeare classes then. He has been acting for about 18 years, and once played the role of Orlando in As You Like It at the Juilliard School. Below is a Q & A with this veteran actor:

Q: Why did you decide to be an actor?

A: I went to performing arts high school, and I loved live theater. I love stage craft, I loved everything about it from mask work to movement exercises to voice and speech.

Q: What is your favorite Shakespeare play?

A: It’s between Romeo and Juliet and As You Like It. There’s something just fun and fluid about them. They are obviously not as heavy as the history plays, which are great too, but there’s something kind of light and fluid about it that feels pretty assessable.

Q: How do you memorize so many lines for each production?

A: You rehearse a professional show four weeks, typically. And you’re usually rehearsing eight hours a day, six days a week. Actors only get one day off and that’s Monday, and so actors don’t have weekends. So you rehearse eight hours a day for four weeks, and that’s when you learn your lines.

Q: How is performing Shakespeare’s plays different from performing other plays?

A: There is different work you have to do with the text and the language in deciphering it. You literally read it over and over again. You read it the first time for sense, the second time for a little more clarity, and you read it again to get explanations for some of those things, and you just keep reading it. And each time you read it, you’re working on the lines over and over again, and that helps you with memorization, too.

Q: What play were you a part of that was particularly memorable?

A: The very first show I was in was The Tempest [by William Shakespeare] and it was a beautifully staged production by the director Garland Wright, who is passed away now. I was understudying for Caliban [a character in the play], and I ended up going on in the very last performance.

Q: Are there events in which you worked with directors who had interesting “concepts” of plays?

A: The production of Othello in which Patrick Stewart played Othello was a drastic concept. … The director set it up with Patrick Stewart playing the Moor surrounded by an African American ensemble. That concept from the director’s standpoint was called a “photo negative.” And the entire show was sold out two months before we even started rehearsing, based on that concept and based on Patrick Stewart being the star.

Q: Do you ever get nervous, and how do you handle it?

A: I do. I actually have Tourette’s syndrome, which is a nervous condition that can be exacerbated if I get really worked up. So even when I’m in my everyday life, I have to work on keeping myself calm, and I do that by planning. And so if I have a show that night, I spend time during the day pacing myself [and] getting ready so that it doesn’t become something that I’m nervous about.

Q: What do you advise aspiring actors/actresses?

A: I advise them to not put their all their eggs in one basket. I encourage them to explore a really liberal education and if they really want to pursue acting, pursue it as a craft, not as a way to seek fame or popularity.

Q: Is there anything else you would like others to know about you?

A: That I’m an actor with Tourette’s syndrome. For me that’s a huge accomplishment, because most people can’t control their ticks. So for me to be able to perform on stage without people knowing that I have it and overcoming my symptoms is a huge personal accomplishment for me. And I feel I have been able to do that through [performing] Shakespeare material.