Shakespeare, Fakespeare

It is has become a noted, coveted achievement for the most adept actors to portray one of William Shakespeare's characters in film or theater. Sir Lawrence Olivier, Patrick Stewart, Mel Gibson, Kenneth Branagh, Emma Thompson, Annette Bening and Laurence Fishburne are just a few to do justice to the bard's most popular works.

Watching a purist's vision of the works of William Shakespeare come to life on screen or stage is a pastime enjoyed by an ever-increasing audience. But the purist's vision is not the only, or always the most enjoyable, experience of Shakespeare's work at our disposal. I often wonder what Shakespeare would think of Romeo and Juliet portrayed as rebellious 20th century Los Angeles youth. Is the brilliant Bard tossing about in his grave as we take liberties with his masterpieces again and again? Perhaps not, given that the man himself utilized his creative, if somewhat rebellious, genius to invent new words, depict scandalous situations, and wrench the heart and soul with poignant twists of fate. Laugh, he may, but toss about, I think not.

Adapting Shakespeare's venerable works to suit a specific audience has taken many forms in today's society. Like Dallas' Shakespeare in the Park, which routinely portrays a different, unique setting for each play, from a 19th century Spanish Romeo and Juliet, to a 1920s-style setting for Comedy of Errors, performing companies throughout the world take license with settings and costumes. There is another genre, however, that takes more than a few liberties with Shakespeare's work, parodying Shakespeare in rare, comedic form.

Take, Sound & Fury, for instance, a self-proclaimed nouveau-vaudeville troupe of players who present original twisted comic works loosely in the style of ' that Bard fellow, Bill Shakespeare.' Richard Maritzer, Shannon Derry and Shelby Bond draw crowds of patrons at Renaissance faires from Seattle to Houston with their lighthearted, irreverent wordplay and witty renditions of Shakespeare: The Lost Episodes, newly rediscovered drafts by the Elizabethan playwright.

Pious patrons beware! Not a show meant for younger audiences, the troupe enlightens audiences with performances that depict a saucier side of the Bard's work. Rousing performances, such as Testaclese and Ye Sack of Rome and Titus Rectus, are ripe with innuendo and ribald jests. Double entendres are the name of the game and these men are masters of the art.

The players of Sound & Fury describe the history of these new plays as having first been discovered in 1917 by archeolinguistic adventurer, Damascus Steel, who retrieved the lost fragments hidden in England for three centuries. Using the scientific methods of the time, supposedly the Pacoima Shakespeare Society attempted to decode the works and produce them, but met, however, with unfortunate and injurious results. A second attempt to produce the plays happened in 1926 when literary cloning was developed and the works were brought again to light. "Sadly, the results of the cloning made the fragments even more combustible and the works were sealed away until 1998 when our heroes, using new advances in Literary-Genetic Reconstruction, brought these hitherto unseen plays to public notice." Able to leap tall men in a single bound (well not really, but they do try some interesting stunts on stage), the players of Sound & Fury have created a loyal following and continue to bring in rave reviews from critics and fans alike.

Another popular troupe, and one of the most successful companies to capitalize on parodying Shakespeare's works, derives its name from the troupe's comic reduction of the Bard's plays into tight little skits that cut away the fluff and get right to the meat of the story; the sex and the violence. In a rap song written for The Reduced Shakespeare Company's Radio Show, the troupe describes their art. "We found a way to satisfy your cravin' when you're bored of the Bard of Stratford upon Avon. We take his boring plays and we reduce Ôem! The poetry, the subplot, the imagery that's illin', and we get right to the sex and to the killin'! We take it over the top! OTT, the RSC, OTT, the RSC..." You get the idea.

Irrepressibly irreverent, the troupe's downsized renditions of the Shakespearean craft bounce from outrageously incongruous misinterpretations of a play's lines to crazed philosophical musings. At one point, two of the actors spend a goodly five minutes debating and proving that Hamlet had an edible complex and that in fact, the entire work revolves around food beginning with the name of the main character.

Over the top or not, The Reduced Shakespeare Company, which was founded in 1981 by Daniel Singer and developed as an acting troupe performing and passing their hats at various Renaissance faires in California in the early 1980s, has captured the hearts and funny bones of more than one prestigious audience. The troupe has performed witty, rapid condensations of all things serious, such as The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged), The Complete History of America (abridged), and The Bible - The Complete Word of God (abridged), for audiences at the White House, Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center's Serious Fun Festival and the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, Mass. The troupe has toured the globe, including recent performances in Israel, Ireland, Canada and a year-long run in London's famed West End.

For more information about Sound & Fury, visit their web site at www.soundandfury.org. For more information about The Reduced Shakespeare Company, visit their web site at www.actwin.com/REDUCED/