Acorn Productions' Naked Shakespeare presents DRUNKS AND FOOLS

Naked Shakespeare, Acorn Productions' performance series dedicated to presenting the works of the Bard in accessible ways for contemporary audiences, finishes the first full season of their popular series of First Friday performances next month with two performances of Drunks and Fools. Sub-titled "An evening at the Eastcheap Tavern," the show opens with the seldom-performed Christopher Sly "induction" from The Taming of the Shrew, and features a series of monologues and scenes from a variety of miscreants and ne-er-do-wells, including Falstaff, Bottom, Feste, Caliban, and the Gravediggers from Hamlet. The room will be set up with table seating in order to create the sense that actors and audience alike are in a bar, and the pieces will be cued with contemporary language spoken by random audience members as Naked Shakespeare used to do during the company's performance run at the old Wine Bar on Wharf Street. Veteran theater artist Harlan Baker directs the show, which is presented free of charge with a $10 suggested donation. For more information, audience members are encouraged to visit Acorn's website at www.acorn-productions.org

Shakespeare's plays are populated with a series of colorful working-class characters whose stories often mirrored the action of the more well-to-do characters in order to both entertain the groundlings and reinforce some of the play's observations on human nature. Additionally, several plays contain court jesters, otherwise known as fools, whose dramatic purpose is to comment on the often-foolish ways of the ruling class. Drunks and Fools brings together many of these characters in the guise of customers at the Eastcheap Tavern, many of whom will be seated in and around the audience as the evening unfolds, so that the audience will never know whether they are seated next to an actor or not. The order of the pieces, with the exception of the framing device of the three Christopher Sly scenes, will be randomly determined for both shows, meaning actors and audience alike will never know what character will be featured next. In addition to the well-known characters referenced above, the performance also features selections by Dogberry (Much Ado About Nothing), Launce (Two Gentlemen of Verona), Launcelot (The Merchant of Venice), the Porter (Macbeth), Egeus (Midsummer's Night Dream), as well as a few other special guests. Naked Shakespeare's First Friday series will resume again in October of 2016 with a new season of six shows.