They’ll do all of Shakespeare’s plays. All of his sonnets. All in 90 minutes.
And it will be “90 minutes of mayhem,” said Mark Bracken, director of “The Complete Works of Shakespeare Abridged.” The play opens Oct. 1 at Three Brothers Theatre in Waukegan, and runs at 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays through Oct. 30.
“It’s very fast paced. You’re on a roller-coaster ride for 90 minutes.” Bracken said. “We spend a lot of time on the big plays and we condense the lesser known plays into smaller blips.”
The cast includes three males, Richard W. Adams, one of the founders of Three Brothers Theatre, and two Chicago actors, Michael Wilson and Mac Westcott.
They’ll play dozens of different parts, sometimes switching characters in less than a minute. Sometimes they can get into all those characters correctly, sometimes not, Bracken said. “That’s part of the fun,” said Bracken, who last directed “Jacob Marley’s Christmas Carol” for Three Brothers Theatre a few years ago.
The actors also will switch costumes — at least a dozen — and juggle various props, wigs and masks.
The play, written by Adam Long, Daniel Singer and Jess Winfield parodies Shakespeare’s works as well as Shakespeare himself.
To direct it, you have to have a knowledge of Shakespeare, said Bracken, a classically trained actor and director of production at the Chicago High School for the Arts.
But the audience doesn’t need to know much about Shakespeare’s plays to enjoy it, he said. “Everyone at some point in their life, whether they know it or not, has been exposed to Shakespeare,” Bracken said.
They know the plots — for example, the star-crossed lovers in “Romeo and Juliet,” upon which “West Side Story” was based, he said.
“Some of the Shakespearean speech and text is there, but it’s all restructured into being more relatable” to modern days, he said.
“Is there a plot? Yes and no. People are getting together to do all the works of William Shakespeare. That is the plot — and how they are going to manage that in 90 minutes.”
Bracken’s favorite part of the play is during scenes from the tragedy “Hamlet.”
“It’s hysterical. In some respects, tragedies are actually funnier than the comedies,” he said, referring to line in the play.
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With “Hamlet,” the audience is invited to get involved and some are invited on stage. “We pull out biohazard suits for the actors. It gets a little silly. We make sure people are masked, double masked, even triple masked,” he said, referring to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The scene is when Hamlet tells Ophelia to “get thee to a nunnery.”
“We bring in the audience to help Ophelia express all the complicated thoughts she’s experiencing,” Bracken said.
One play most folks may not recognize is “Titus Andronicus.”
“The play itself is incredibly gory and gross,” Bracken said.
The authors decided to present the play in the form of a cooking show. “So we’re structuring it a la Julia Child. It’s very funny.”
Each of the play’s titles is mentioned — for example, the actor will say, “And now we present ‘Titus Andronicus’ as a cooking show.”
The play’s authors found a unique way to present Shakespeare’s sonnets, said Bracken, but he’s not saying any more because he wants the audience to be surprised.
Bracken said Three Brothers Theatre has many precautions set up to keep the audience and actors safe during the pandemic. Masks need to be worn, and other precautions can be found on the website.
“People should come because it’s time for us to laugh. It’s really that simple,” Bracken said. “We’re welcoming live theater back after 16 months. It’s time for us to laugh, to smile, to come together and enjoy each other’s company.
“There’s really something special about being in a room and being able to laugh with someone, being able to share an experience, especially with complete strangers. You’re all tied together from this one experience you hadn’t had before,” he said.
For Bracken, directing live theater again “is like being able to take a breath again. I’m getting to create art and I’m getting to create art with amazing people.”
‘The Complete Works of Shakespeare Abridged’
When: 7:30 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays, Oct. 1-30
Where: Three Brothers Theatre, 221 N. Genesee St., Waukegan
Tickets: $15-$20
Information: 224- 419-4325; threebrotherstheatre.com/
Sheryl DeVore is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.