As You Like It is made by theater artists who lost work due to the COVID-19 pandemic. To create and reconnect with our artistic community, we made a film reimagining one of Shakespeare's most iconic settings, the Forest of Arden, in order to explore what it means to change in isolation.

 

This psychological exploration of Shakespeare's As You Like It finds four runaways, Rosalind, Celia, Orlando, and Jaques, in the same deserted New York City apartment. When the exiled Rosalind discovers her love-sick suitor Orlando has arrived, she devises a plan to test the limits of his love by wooing him under a concealed identity. As Orlando attempts to prove to the disguised Rosalind his devotion, bonds are tested and a melancholy Jaques along with a protective Celia navigate sharing one space with two lovers. Rosalind's love game soon backfires when a wounded Orlando's desire turns to doubt and her love turns to lunacy. 

 

Kendall imagined the characters of As You Like It as people on the precipice of becoming who they're inevitably going to be for the rest of their lives. During quarantine, she began to see the Forest of Arden as an arena for involuntary reflection and growth. A place where characters are forced to wrestle with who they think they are because they've been separated from everything they thought they knew. As she was about to move out of her NYC apartment, where she experienced shutdown and quarantine, she was excited by the opportunity to make this empty space into a modern twist on the Forest of Arden. She mentioned this idea to Marc David Wright, one of her roommates. That night, they sat at their living room table and started drafting an adaptation. They asked their roommates, close friends, and collaborators to be part of it. Everyone said yes! So then all they had to do was...make a movie.

Over the next two months this team would: rehearse in this apartment, plan out COVID Safe Shoot Days, coordinate schedules, Vincent Gunn would paint and create a scenic backdrop in their foyer, Kendall and Marc would coordinate who would DP when, and we would shoot the principal photography for our film.

Marc David Wright and Kendall Cafaro doubled and tripled their creative roles to limit the number of artists on set for COVID Safety and to maintain budget. See some images of them taking on roles as adapters, directors, performers and even...cinematographers.

Cast of As You Like It rehearsing with the camera before shoot day

 

Designed and Created By: Vincent Gunn, our Production Designer for the TV world in As You Like It.

 

Editing and Special Effects By: Anna Michael

 

Costume, Hair, and Makeup Design By: John Beltre, Lighting By: Vittoria Orlando

 

This story and this team's experience in the Covid-19 shutdown are intricately linked. The four roommates in our film are four real life roommates. Our adaptation is inspired by the months of isolation and introspection experienced in our apartment, where we went on our own journeys of self-discovery while the lives we once knew seemed to be forever changed. We found connection between these Shakespeare characters fleeing banishment in the Forest of Arden and us LIVING WITH ROOMMATES IN A PANDEMIC. Which, any New Yorker knows, is a whole thing. During shutdown, we relied on friends and family we lived with for emotional support while also wondered how much longer we could look at these people within the confines of one space.

When we began filming this project, most of our team was fully vaccinated and events in NYC were starting to open up again. This was exciting...but also a bit terrifying. For many of us, this shoot would be the first group in-person creative venture since the beginning of 2020. Similar to these characters leaving the Forest of Arden, we'd soon be leaving the life of COVID-19 shutdown and working in unfamiliar territory. 

 

 Stills from As You Like It principal photography. Cast: Kendall Cafaro, Madalyn Baker, Jamie Wygle, Marc David Wright, Kayce Wilson, Franco Giacomarra

 

With limited funding, resources, and a lot of hand sanitizer, this group of artists created the principal photography for a 60 minute film. What started as an idea between tight friends and roommates became a project that grew to include an innovative community of NYC based artists. As You Like It was made primarily by theater-turned-filmmakers during Spring 2021. Due to shutdown, theater artists were largely left without work. This especially impacted young emerging theater artists who had projects and jobs underway before the pandemic hit. In supporting our project, you'd be putting funds back into these artists' pockets as well as contributing to a project that was independetly funded by artists involved.

 

Our Production team transforming a three bedroom apartment into our own Forest of Arden.

 

In addition to raising funds for our post production costs, we are raising money for artists involved in the conception and execution of the principal photography for As You Like It. Every artist involved in this project was paid a stipend but we’re hoping to provide additional compensation for the artists who put in overtime to make this film happen. This project was independently funded by artists involved which is why we're also raising funds to recoup certain production costs so we can all keep making work.

After we've finished post production, we plan to have a premiere screening in NYC in 2022 then distrubute As You Like It to view online.

For more info, you can see a breakdown of the Seed and Spark Campaign Budget over on the Wishlist page!

Seed & Spark requires at least 80% of the project to be funded in order to get the green light. We need to reach our goal in 30 days or we don't receive anything and all your contributions revert back to you.

 

If you are unable to join us monetarily at this time, there are other ways to support us! 

FOLLOW the Seed & Spark Campaign: Once we reach 250 followers, regardless of how many people pledge, we’ll get access to creator discounts for this and future projects!

SHARE our project on Social Media @asyoulikeitfilm and like our facebook page As You Like It Film