A proper funny play that made Shakespeare to all. That's what we like to see...
I had the pleasure of seeing the Reduced Shakesprere Company for the first time on Thursday evening. The self-proclaimed ‘bad boys of abridgement’ took the recent Shakespeare finding, and turned it into 90 minutes of nonstop laughter.
The plot presents the discovery of Shakespeare’s lost play in a Leicester car park, and three playwrights attempt to condense 100 hours into a tenth of that.
The main characters are Puck and Ariel and we follow their ongoing rivalry. The play introduces several of Shakespeare’s most famous characters prior to their own plays. It unfolds as the two try to out-fairy each other, and muddle up the others in their magical mishaps.
There’s hardly time to pause between puns and jokes and accents, and it’s a whirlwind of fun. Their recreation of the weird sisters was hilarious – not to mention some seriously impressive costume changes.
A really nice personal touch from them was that they all came into the lobby to chat with everyone at the end, very humbling on their behalf.
Altogether: the production was thoroughly entertaining. Shakespeare designed for all, and re-imagined as you’ve never seen it before.
The Reduced Shakespeare Company performed Shakespeare's Long Lost Play at Nottingham Playhouse on Thursday 9 February.
Reduced Shakespeare Company's website
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