The idea for Swiftly Tilting Theatre Project came out of my deep need and love of theatre, which I want to share with everyone. I forgot when I started the kickstarter that this didn’t mean demanding more from those who have more or not giving to those who have less.
Everything good and right in my life has happened when I have been honest and true. That doesn’t change because it is “business,” IF WE’RE GOING TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN, WE’RE DOING THIS TOGETHER! Continue reading →
May 3, 4, 10, and 11th at 8PM
Green Street Studios Theatre 185 Green St
Cambridge MA
The Calliope Project Facebook Page
Review by the lovely Gillian Daniels
**EXPLICIT CONTENT INCLUDING RAPE AND VIOLENCE**
Some contemporary productions of Hamlet play with the ambiguity of the Prince of Denmark’s sanity. Is he seeking justice or satisfying a personal vendetta with the logic of a “ghost” to back him up, “mad north-north-west” or just vengeful? In Hamlet Asylum, this ambiguity is dismissed. Most of the play clearly takes place in the head of Bryan Bernfield’s Hamlet. A masked Greek chorus (Meghan Kelly, Amiel Bowers, and Samuel Guerin) speak in the voice of his father, his confidant Horatio, the gravediggers, and others, all in the guise of Hamlet’s repressed desires. It’s a clever idea. The result, though,
is a production both rich with symbols and dark with melodrama. Continue reading →
Omar Robinson, Johnny Lee Davenport*, and Johnnie McQuarley in the foreground, with Jesse Hinson* (Pericles) and the cast in the background. Photo: Stratton McCrady Photography
(Boston) It’s easy to see why Pericles, Prince of Tyre isn’t one of Shakespeare’s best loved plays. The plot is often as lost at sea as the titular character, who drifts from one melodramatic episode to the next on an unending voyage. Pericles’ journey begins with villainous incest and the threat of death and, after abandoning this thread, continues on to tragic storms, kidnappings, and brothels. Taking on this play means a potential mess. Continue reading →
Kickstarter Page The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare
January 9-19, 2014, at The Chain Theatre, 21-28 45th Rd, Long Island City, NY Iphigenia at Aulis by Euripides
March 31-April 13, 2014, at The Secret Theatre’s Poco Theatre, 44-02 33rd St, Long Island City, NY
I passed on my blog to Kitty Drexel when I realized that I could no longer deny my desire to create a theatre company. Long Island City, one of the major residences of New York based theatre people, is becoming an economical alternative for theatrical productions. I was born in New Jersey, so it was only a matter of time before I inched my way back to the area. I want to give artists and audiences the opportunity to be a part of quality theatre, regardless of income. I am trying to do what Whistler in the Dark has done for Boston to the Queens area.
Swiftly Tilting Theatre Project is an artist community that will work towards bringing artists and audiences together while allowing us all to not be crushed by hard economic times.
Please watch the video and even the smallest pledge to the Kickstarter will help my dream become a reality.
(Lowell) William Shakespeare may have done more than any writer of his time to examine both internal and external human drama, but he ducked the fight when it came to his own family; so goes the premise of Shakespeare’s Will, the taut and layered production now playing at the Merrimack Repertory Theatre. The Bard may get the headlines in the play’s title, but it is his absence that is the singular event that shapes the life of his wife, Anne Hathaway, who is the only character in this beautifully lonely one-woman play. Through the brave performance of Seanna McKenna, we are reminded that even in the shadow of greatness the drama of everyday is enough to create volumes of literature. Continue reading →
Davis Square Theatre
255 Elm Street,
Somerville, MA
December 12th, 2012 – January 6th, 2012
Actors Shakespeare Project Facebook Page
Review by Craig Idlebrook
(Somerville) Because Shakespeare has become the standard by which Western theatre is judged, we often forget that the man first had to feel his way in the dark, just like every other art school wannabe. Two Gentlemen of Verona, believed by some to be the Bard’s first play, shows frustrating snatches of his future brilliance. All his trademark comedic pieces are there (cross-dressing women, inconstant lovers and the amazing power of the wilderness to right all wrongs), but this script reads like the man was working on deadline. Themes are picked up and discarded, wordplay only sporadically catches fire and a plot point in the final act makes you want to bang Shakespeare’s head against the floorboards and scream, “Rewrite!” Continue reading →
WHO WE ARE and WHAT We’re Doing:
In Spring of 2013 Vaquero Playground will be bringing it’s biggest production yet: FROM DENMARK WITH LOVE, a mash-up parody of Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the one and only Bond, James Bond.
Written by John J King, the play stars Boston rising legend Daniel Berger-Jones and is directed by Barlow Adamson.
What We Need
Funds raised for the project will go primarily to the hard-working cast, crew, and creative team. But just as importantly, the monies will go towards making sure the show is as BIG, bold, and exciting as it’s sources demand.
$3000 will go towards stipends for artists.
$3000 will go towards set, costumes, props, and necessary rehearsal space.
THREE WAYS TO HELP!
1. Toss us some Cash!
2. Spread the word! Post the video on Facebook and Twitter; email friends; help us tell the world what we’re doing!
3. LIKE us on Facebook – best way to keep tabs on the show and everything from Vaquero Playground!
(Boston) Loosely based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Charlie Sussman (Ken Baltin) is turning 75 and his entire family has come to celebrate with him at his Connecticut beach house to celebrate in The Sussman Variations. His son Jonathan (Steven Barkhimer) has a paper on The Tempest to write that will put his career on the world map. His daughter Janey (Erin Cole) has a big secret to share with the family and is afraid that they won’t share her happiness. Deirdre (Laura Latreille) needs to practice for her international tour and attempts to keep the peace. Granddaughter Miranda (Lauren Thomas) is on house arrest until she writes her college essay. Margery (Cheryl McMahon), Charlie’s wife, wants to throw a party that will reunite the family despite their differences. Each family member suffers under the weight of familial expectations, frustrated with the conflict of whom they are and whom they supposed they should be. Continue reading →
Artist Ben Rubin remixes 37 works in a site-specific, L.E.D-lit, linguistic-supercollider sculpture (that’s also a chandelier)
“The Shakespeare Machine is the creation of Ben Rubin, a local media artist with the spirit of a mad inventor and a passion for data. Commissioned by the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs as part of the Percent for Art program, which funds site-specific pieces in city-funded construction projects, Rubin’s device is at once artwork, chandelier, brain-teaser, and literary tourist attraction.”
ARTnews article excerpts written by Robin Cembalest, posted 10/16/12.
In The Beginning there was the word. And the word was boring. So some old dudes tried to manipulate it through tools called poetry and philosophy and it was less boring. However, people still preferred to watch people getting mocked and maimed in crazy ways such as being eaten by lions, burned at the stake, and hung upside down by their ankles over boiling vats of oil.
In the age known for its rebirth, a chap from the English countryside named Bill, who really liked the poetry
