Refugee and migrant students reimagine Shakespeare

When 15 students from migrant and refugee backgrounds took to the stage at a national Shakespeare festival with a centuries-old monologue on displacement, they didn’t just perform Shakespeare – they reshaped it.

“Imagine that you see the wretched strangers, Their babies at their backs and their poor luggage, Plodding to the ports and coasts for transportation.”

Sophia uttered these words as two of her companions dropped to the ground and started crawling, carrying bundles on their backs.

Fifteen students, who mostly had immigrant, international or refugee backgrounds, were reimagining a monologue spoken by the character of Sir Thomas More in a 16th-century play of the same name.

The monologue was the centrepiece of their performance, The Strangers’ Case, at the Shakespeare Globe Centre NZ (SGCNZ) VUW 2025 National Shakespeare Festival, held at the St James Theatre in Wellington.

You didn’t know Sir Thomas More was a Shakespeare play? Well, it isn’t. But a three-page handwritten revision of its monologue was recently discovered, and is strongly believed to be written by Shakespeare, and to be the only surviving script in Shakespeare’s handwriting.

The play Sir Thomas More is based on real events. On 1 May 1517, rioters began attacking foreigners who had immigrated to London from Lombardy. Lord Chancellor of England Sir Thomas More delivers a monologue addressing rioters: describing the plight of refugees (called ‘strangers’) and asking the rioters to imagine themselves in the strangers’ shoes.

The Strangers’ Case

Dawn Sanders, who runs SCGNZ, asked the Shakespeare Globe Centre in London if the monologue could be acknowledged as part of Shakespeare’s canon and performed for the festival – and they didn’t just say yes – they were excited by it.

The students got permission to include the words ‘Gaza’ and ‘Ukraine’, because of consensus on their modern-day relevance.

“Everyone in the rehearsal room discussed whether that was too pointed,” says director Tama Smith, “but we felt the urgency of making those references to drive the message home.”

In their ensemble performance, the students divided More’s lines between them. They each translated some of the words into their first languages – Italian, German, Thai, Taiwanese, Mandarin, Russian, Japanese, Spanish and Māori – and spoke those words onstage either before or after the English words, creating an echo of sorts.

They moved around the stage, some carrying luggage, or a bundle representing a baby, to convey the forced movement of displaced refugees, who are now searching sanctuary.

A soundscape (created by teaching assistant Nyal) built tension to a threatening climax. Sometimes they cowered in terror. When a noise suggested planes above, they shivered with fear – and when what sounded like a bomb was dropped, they screamed and scattered. Cracks and groans and music suggested storms, waves and climate catastrophes.

They got a deafening standing ovation and received four awards: Most Original Choice of Play, Most Imaginative and Innovative Production, Extraordinary Performance, and Most Thought-Provoking Performance.

The recognition meant a lot. Tama told the group they weren’t just performers. “You were visionaries, collaborators and truth-tellers.”

A spark takes stage

A theatre-maker, arts educator and the Wellington regional representative for SCGNZ, Tama is also the arts coordinator at Wellington High School, where he teaches an ESOL class for new-immigrant students.

A teaching assistant from that class, Daniela, is a member of the NZ National Refugee Youth Council.

The council and Mamaku (through which Tama runs community-arts performances) proposed a collaboration to SCGNZ. The production would use words, movement, sound and ensemble storytelling to convey refugees’ experiences.

Tama hoped to find some refugee students to take part, but that was easier said than done. So he approached Wellington High School rangatahi whose families immigrated here or who have international or multicultural backgrounds.

Although Tama doesn’t run drama classes at the school, he knows a lot of students and their backgrounds, personalities, talents and ways of expressing themselves.

The modern-day relevance drew students in. It struck the students that the treatment of immigrants and refugees hasn’t really changed in half a millennium.

As Sophie says: “Similar events and issues are being discussed in the same ways and words now as they were in the 1500s.”

Eru was already super busy with kapa haka and waka ama when Tama “roped him into this random Shakespeare thing”.

“I thought ‘why not?’ It’s something interesting I’ve never done and it could be fun’.”

Reimagining relevance

The initial cast was 10 students (including a Wellington Girls’ College exchange student) plus a student violinist, Ben.

In their performance, they spoke Shakespeare’s original lines as per festival rules. Tama had earlier ‘translated’ the lines into modern-day English simply to help the students better understand it.

Here’s some of his modernised text.

“Imagine if the king, who is kind and forgiving if you understand you have done wrong, only punished you by sending you away – where would you go? What country would take you in if you made the same mistake?”

That helped them better understand the original text that they would speak:

“As but to banish you, whither would you go? What country, by the nature of your error, Should give you harbour? Go you to France or Flanders, To any German province, to Gaza or Ukraine, Nay, anywhere that not adheres to England, Why, you must needs be strangers: would you be pleased to find a nation of such barbarous temper.”

The students were empowered to contribute to all aspects of the production, from choreography to directing to translation.

Sophie, whose Russian family immigrated here five years ago, was associate director.

“Sophie was really helpful in figuring out how to go from words on a page to conceptualising what it will look like in space,” says Tama.

As for the choreography, Sophie and her ballerina friend Rachel tried out the dance-like movements (initially in a playground) then workshopped these with other members.

“It was transforming how we felt into movement,” says Sophie. Rachel choreographed and performed a moving ballet piece within the work.

After two hours of rehearsals on Wednesday and Friday afternoons for two months, they performed The Strangers’ Case at the SCGNZ Wellington Regional Festival in April.

Praised for its originality, courage and emotional power, it was selected to represent the region at the national festival on King’s Birthday weekend.

Dedicated to authenticity

The students had always felt the responsibility to properly represent refugees. But with the nationals looming, they decided to try even harder to find refugees to join the group.

Four refugee young people aged 15 to 18 and living in Levin came on board; their families are from Colombia and Venezuela. One mother and father drove them from Levin to Wellington and back twice a week for a month.

“As I was directing,” says Tama, “Daniela was immediately translating lines into Spanish. Finding understanding beyond language challenges was central for us throughout.”

Culturally and linguistically, the students really did make Shakespeare their own.

Sophia says most of the refugee students didn’t have great English, and she doesn’t have great Spanish. But they had enough to communicate about the play.

“There was laughter and respect – they were spending so much time travelling.”

Having four more actors enabled the group to ‘do more’ –particularly in the ocean scene. As they heard what sounded like revving engines of boats, some of the actors swayed back and forth onstage.

Four others walked onto the stage, with only their toes visible because they were wearing rectangles of silver tinfoil to represent the sea between North Africa and Europe that migrants try to cross, fleeing war, persecution and poverty.

Many boats don’t make it. When the performers left the stage, they left their things strewn around.

“We wanted to get flotsam and jetsam, which represents that urgency, into the performance. And that horrible fact that some people couldn’t hold onto their children.”

The students found all this confronting.

“It’s been 500 years since this play,” says Sophia, “and what’s changed? It’s so important that we keep shedding light on terrible actions towards refugees and displaced people. I felt the weight of it. It was more than a role. After our final performance, I cried.”

Eru had to run off to do kapa haka but gave another student a quick hug first. Some needed hugs, others needed alone time, and others were approached by students wanting to discuss the material.

Sophie gave Tama what they called “a challenge,” early on. “It was partly about avoiding victimisation,” says Sophie.

“Instead, we wanted to have a dialogue with the audience that doesn’t lead them to be terrified or sad but might mean they go do whatever they can to try to change things.”

A strong legacy

Established and run by Dawn Sanders, Shakespeare Globe Centre New Zealand (SGCNZ) held its first Shakespeare Festivals in seven regions in 1992.

Since 2017 there have been 24 regional festivals annually (minus the odd one owing to weather events and Covid).

Selected groups from the regionals perform in Wellington at the national festivals (there have been 34 so far).

The scale of impact:

• 145,500 students have now participated in festivals nationwide over the past 34 years.

• 1,316 students have attended SGCNZ National Shakespeare Schools Production: a nine-day course with around 50 students chosen from the regionals and nationals.

• 672 students have been chosen to go to The Globe in London as members of SGCNZ Young Shakespeare Company.

• 71 SGCNZ Teachers Go Global have been in the special biennial programme for school and community theatre teachers at The Globe in London.

SGCNZ measure success partly through student feedback from questionnaires at the national festival and regional festivals.

When asked ‘why’ they loved being part of the festivals, Dawn says their reasons include:

• learning how to understand Shakespeare’s text

• close reading that benefits their learning

• discovering the parallels of themes today – social, political, personal

• realising how much Shakespeare is about human relationships

• finding out the old and new meanings of the words

• having fun with puns and parodies, allegory and alliteration

• collaborations that will continue in future years.

“Feedback is overwhelmingly positive. The words ‘life changing’ are the most common reaction,” says Dawn.

“Where there are constructive criticisms, these are evaluated and alterations are made as and where appropriate and applicable.”

How has feedback shaped the festival and its flow-on events?

Dawn says that the SGCNZ National Shakespeare Schools Production has morphed from being a seven-day event, to nine., in association with the young people ‘reshaping’ the format.

“The actual ‘shape of the festival’ has been tweaked over the years. I have youth observers on the board, whom I consult, plus an informal youth advisory group.”