Meet the Artists: On Playing Villains, with Erin Foster and Keydron Dunn
Operas tend to feature great villains. Mustache-twirling sexual blackmailers, sleazy noblemen, the devil himself. Julie, Monster doesn’t give the title character a single nemesis because she’s constantly fighting one manifestation of oppression or another.
Erin (Rin) Foster gets to play three unpleasant agents of the patriarchy who tangle with Julie at different points in the show: a belligerent country boy at a sword fighting exhibition, a drunken gallant who tries to beat her up, and a constable sent to escort her to her execution. Keydron Dunn plays Rin’s sidekick constable (as well as more positive characters).
Rin Foster, getting to the essence of playing the villain
Rin and Keydron are deeply nice people. We asked them how they feel about the cognitive dissonance of playing characters they would never want to associate with in real life.
For the video, CLICK HERE
Transcript
Rin: Well, I would say that as a person and as a performer, I typically try -- I am interested in characters that are morally ambiguous or even outright nasty. And I like to find the good in the bad characters as well as the bad in the good characters to make the characters complex and a real person that people can understand justifications and motivations from.
Keydron: Yeah, I like to do these roundabout things, because no one ever thinks that their character is, no villain ever thinks of themselves as a villain.
Rin: Yeah.
Keydron: We have motives, and our motives is to, well, my motive, is to just not piss off my boss. That's what that is.
Rin: Yeah, and to understand the cultural implications of the time period and where you are and class structure, kind of, you know. If I don't, if I don't arrest them, maybe I'll get arrested.
Keydron: Oh, yeah, and we're burning people at the stake.
Rin: Someone has to be at the bottom of the totem pole.
Keydron: If someone's being burnt, if we're going to go burn somebody at the stake, we can be burned at the stake.
Rin: Yeah.
Keydron: I ain't trying to be burned at the stake. And I'll tell you what, I'm going to go for my target. I'm going for my target.
Rin: I'll do what I'm told, yeah.
Keydron: Do what I'm told.
The real Rin and Keydron are respectively a newcomer and a veteran in Richmond’s performing arts scene.
Rin, who studied at the University of Mary Washington, has a background in forensic-style acting and the visual arts. As she describes herself, “You’ll know her as soon as you see her grooving down the streets, seeming to have just come from both Shakespearean times and the seventies.”
Keydron is a well-known Richmond performer: a soloist at historic St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on Grace, and an actor with credits in shows such as "Once on this Island," and "Hair." He is a regular in Firehouse Theatre and RVA Baroque shows and serves on RVA Baroque’s board of directors. He’s also a beloved burlesque performer: stage name Barnabus Beverly Burnside.
Erin Foster, who played Constable
Keydron Dunn, who played Gaultier
