Shakespeare's TWELFTH NIGHT to Be Presented At Historic Strawberry Mansion

Indecorous Theatre Productions brings discussions of sexuality, gender identity, and queer culture to the forefront in their upcoming production of William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night for the 2021 Philadelphia Fringe Festival.

This outdoor production at the beautiful Historic Strawberry Mansion features Shakespeare's most famous pants-wearing heroine, Viola, and their journey not only with love and friendship but with their own gender and sexual identity. This now truly gay romp, shows how Viola's own transformation changes everyone around them by challenging the status quo and freeing everyone to find their own love and truth.

Performances will be September 11, 12, 18, 25, and 26, all at 4:30pm at the Historic Strawberry Mansion. Tickets available through FringeArts and at the door. https://fringearts.com/event/twelfth-night/

In an interview with some of the cast, conversations inevitably returned to the queerness surrounding this show and how this production is taking steps to make the implicit explicit. Kevin J McCann (He/Him), who plays Orsino said, "Usually Antonio gets to be gay and that's it. This time he's straight[...] Now eveyone else is gay and I think explicitly so in a way that the text supports."

Amanda Charlie Clark (they/them), the nonbinary actor playing Viola went on to say, "A lot of times, in this show and in a lot of Shakespeare [...] they do play with queerness but, at the end of the day, it's a punchline. And this show is hilarious and funny and some of the gayness is what adds to the comedy but in this production it's not the punchline. The punchline isn't that Orsino has bi-panic and then gets over it. We're really embracing each of these character's journeys with their sexuality and honoring that[...] and still letting the rest of the play be funny."

Indecorous Theatre Productions roots itself in "Classical Theatre", an art form that, in the modern era, has been claimed by a social elite. Our mission is to take away the gated community feel from these Classics and make them accessible and available to the people for which they were written. These stories are for everyone and for today. They still resonate and grow and change. Using the beauty of these texts that have beaten time we want to tell new stories with new bodies and open up the conversation. Because at the end of the day, this work, these words, and art is about real people and all the diversity and change and indecorous energy real people create.

To learn more, visit indecoroustheatre.com. To donate to our production, or see the full interview with the leads of Twelfth Night, visit https://www.gofundme.com/f/y8jer-twelfth-night.

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