Guilford School of Acting: Shakespeare for Breakfast
PERFORMERS: Emily Dilworth, Tomas Howser, Brodie Husband, Caitlin O’Donnell, Elliott Samuels
ADAPTATION AND DIRECTION: Jaq Bessell
PRODUCTION: Guildford School of Acting, UK
When: July 25, 2021, 11 a.m. – a video recording will be shown in the theatre
Who needs a McMuffin when you can have some Macbeth? Why have an omelette when you can have a Hamlet?
A small company of actors will serve up a smorgasbord of scenes from Shakespeare’s most popular plays, performed in Shakespeare’s hallmark style: no sets, no lighting, but plenty of pace. A feast for the imagination, running at just under one hour, this is fast food of the very best kind.
What happens when Shakespeare’s best-loved words are scrambled? What would happen if the villainous Richard III suddenly found himself in a romantic comedy? A cross between the “Greatest Hits of Shakespeare” and The Play That Goes Wrong, this playful piece sees five friends – named after Shakespeare’s “rude mechanicals” from A Midsummer Night’s Dream – attempting to rehearse a play in their local primary school gym, while navigating their love-lives… the trouble is, someone is seriously meddling with the scripts for both.
The script has been constructed (almost) entirely from some of Shakespeare’s best loved scenes and speeches, which have been sliced and scrambled together in ways that are sometimes witty, sometimes absurd, but (we hope) always fresh. It’s definitely Shakespeare…but not as we know it!
Video
Gallery
From left to right: Tomas Howser, Emily Dilworth, Elliott Samuels, Caitlin O’Donnell, Brodie Husband