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NEWS
Actors step into their silly side of Shakespeare
By Ashley Hoffman, "The Gainesville Sun"
Shakespeare once
wrote "With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come."
Members of the alternating three-man cast of The Complete Works of
Shakespeare Abridged, will adopt the role of the jester, promising to
jump start any old wrinkles in 90 minutes flat.
The show opens Friday and runs through Aug. 12 in the Black Box Theatre
at the Nadine McGuire Theatre and Dance Pavilion.
"It's really witty and clever," said director Kevin Marshall. "I sit
there in rehearsal and laugh constantly. The audiences will have a
smiles on their faces the whole night."
Written by the Reduced Shakespeare Company in 1994, the farcical
speed-through performance transforms the work of genius into an
uproarious frolic that was one of the longest-running productions at the
Criterion Theater in London.
"It's a marathon of Shakespeare's greatest hits," Marshall said.
The parody casts the fourth wall to the four winds, and encourages
audience participation in the grand tradition of the Globe Theatre.
Shakespeare's plays, in total 37 masterpieces, take the stage in several
contemporary forms, all of which have proven palatable for the
Elizabethan theatre-wary.
"You don't have to know anything about Shakespeare to love this play,"
said actor Michael Toth, who is pursuing his Master of Fine Arts in
acting. "Even though the play makes fun of Shakespeare, you will walk
away knowing more about his work."
Toth cited the inspiration of the original script.
"What's fascinating about the show is that it was developed by the three
authors through improvisation," Toth said.
Before his acting career in Gainesville, Toth studied Shakespeare in
Winchester, England after receiving the Rotary Ambassadorial
Scholarship.
The production will bear the unique badge of the cast, which keeps
abreast of recent developments in pop culture to add to the comedy.
Hilarity is known to ensue when actors convert Titus Adronicus into a
cooking show and deliver Othello as a hip-hop song.
The Shakespearean "players" will become American football players in a
match that recalls Will's original histories.
The actors hurl around the British crown in the same irreverent,
Monty-Python-esque manner with which they toss around the words written
by the most renowned playwright ever to dab a feather quill to an ink
pot. Marshall is confident that the cast will serve the comedic nature of
the play to great effect.
"These are very talented actors." Marshall said. "It's a no-holds-barred
approach to Shakespeare and it has improvisational roots, however,
everything is well-rehearsed."
Marshall divided the cast into two teams. The blue team will include
Bryant Smith, Robert Smith and Matthew Lindsay, while Michael T. Toth,
Daniel Flores and Ted Stephens III make up the orange team.
"It's been a real joy to work with this cast," Marshall said. "We have
tried to make it contemporary so whatever is on the news you'll see on
the stage. It's anachronistic in that we are blending 2007 with
Shakespeare, but we hope that the audience will forgive us."
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