BWW Interviews: New Players Theater's Contrasting Plays TAMING OF THE SHREW and HENRY IV, PART ONE

Among its many assets, Columbus, Ohio has an abundance of college students, research facilities, and, according to Kate Tull, Shakespearean actors.

The managing director of the New Players Theater is taking an advantage of the last factor during "The Rowdy Ones" Shakespearean Festival at the Island, located at 3500 Mill Run in Hilliard. New Players is presenting back-to-back productions of TAMING OF THE SHREW and HENRY IV PART ONE. NPT will stage TAMING OF THE SHREW July 6-7, 11-12, and 19-21 and HENRY IV PART ONE will be performed on July 5, 13-14, 18 and 25-28.

"(NPT founders Mark Mann and Tim Browning) know everyone (in the Shakespearean community in Columbus)," Tull says. "As a result, we're able to bring in a lot of experienced actors. (TAMING OF THE SHREW director) Jocelyn Wiebe is a recent Ohio University graduate so we also have a lot of a new faces in this group who received great training at Ohio U and are now living in Columbus."

The two shows share eight actors including Austin Andres (Lucentio in SHREW and Poins in HENRY), Miles Drake (Gremio in SHREW and Vernon in HENRY), John Feather (Vincentio in SHREW and Northumberland in HENRY), Clifton Holznagel (Tranio in SHREW and Blunt and Sheriff in HENRY), Jack Miller (a haberdasher and a servant in SHREW and a traveler in HENRY), Mackenzie Wallace (an officer and a servant in SHREW and John of Lancaster in HENRY) , Scott Willis (Baptista in SHREW and Glendower and Douglas in HENRY) and Christina Yoho (Biondello in SHREW and Gadshill in HENRY).

Outside of the common actors and that they were both written by William Shakespeare, the two NPT offerings couldn't be more different. TAMING OF SHREW, the tale of the unlikely courtship between Petruchio (Browning) and the fiercely independent Kate (Amanda Cawthorne), is one of Shakespeare's most beloved comedies. Hollywood has tried its hand at updating the comedy. Films KISS ME KATE (1953) and TEN THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU (1999) are both based on the play.

HENRY IV, PART ONE, on the other hand, is one of Shakespeare's 10 historical plays. The play centers on the strained relationship between King Henry IV (Rick Clark) and his son Prince Hal (David Tull) while noblemen in the North plot against the monarch. It seems to be at the polar end of TAMING OF SHREW but Tull said the drama features a lot of comedy, including the first appearance of the lovable drunk Falstaff (John Tener). Tull says Falstaff may be one of the funniest characters in Shakespeare's collection of 38 plays.

"(HENRY) is one of Shakespeare's best written plays but it is not produced very much because it is one of his historical plays," Kate Tull says. "We wanted to make sure we weren't doing the old standbys. We wanted to bring one in that not too many people have seen around here. It's been done around here but not as frequently."

The show is sort of a reunion for Browning, the New Players Theater's artistic director. In the 1990s, he met Mann in a production of HENRY IV PART ONE. Robert Behrens, who teaches stage combat and acting at Otterbein University, directed both the 1990s version and the current production of HENRY.

"It all kind of comes full circle," Kate Tull says. "We're very lucky because of their connections and how they're able to bring in a lot of the veterans."

TAMING OF THE SHREW will be performed July 6-7, 11-12, and 19-21 and HENRY IV PART ONE will be staged on July 5, 13-14, 18 and 25-28. All day-of-the-performance tickets for the New Players Theater Festival are pay-what-you-will.

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