BRUSH UP ON THE BARD, HAVE A GLADIOPOUS TIME

"Brush Up Your Shakespeare" and have a gladiopous good time!

Yep Old Crow invented that word, mainly to express delight at "Bits of the Bard Shakespeare's Ladies," the current production of University Theatre, opening in the Lab (Room 104, Grauel Language Arts Building) tonight, and running through Saturday night, with non-curtain time at 8.

Mostly new faces, new voices, new talent and a nice mix of traditional and non-traditional, and non-theater majors, ably abetted by community participants make this a show that really MUST go "on the road": it's a perfect touring piece!

"Bits" is the opening event of the Southeast Missouri Shakespeare Festival, which will include lectures and workshops and a main-stage production of "Romeo and Juliet" in April.

Billed as "an evening of dramatic and musical interpretations," the show consists of two acts, both carefully and tastefully structured by Dennis C. Seyer, director of theatre, and equally well-directed by Ellen Seyer.

Act I is made up of monologues (and mini-dialogues) from ten major Shakespearian plays comedy, history, tragedy showing the Bard's remarkable insight into the female psyche. It is interesting that even in the comedy selections, there is an intensity of emotion not immediately discernible when one reads or sees the individual shows in isolation.

Represented are: "The Comedy of Errors," "Richard III," "The Taming of the Shrew," "The Two Gentlemen of Verona," "Romeo and Juliet," "The Merchant of Venice," "Julius Caesar" "Twelfth Night," "Othello," and "Henry VIII."

Act II brings the Bard up-to-date with Shakespeare-based rousing and often moving numbers from recent Broadway musicals: "Kiss Me, Kate," "West Side Story," "The Boys from Syracuse," and "Your Own Thing," underscored, of course, by Cole Porter's "Another Opening, Another Show." Dr. Dan B. Cotner, abandoning his dentist's chair, provides happy piano accompaniment for these selections.

Lacing the show's various components together is "the Bard himself," personified by Daniel Stevens of Benton, a non-traditional student in his first stage appearance.

"The Company," in addition to Stevens, consists of Shannon Curtis of Salem; Colleen Powderly of Cape Girardeau; J. Christopher Dick of Detroit, Mich.; Dante Scaife of Normandy; Leslie Stevens of Benton; Dawn Hilpert of Cape Girardeau; and Kara Weber of University City.

Each plays multiple roles, with varying success (as is to be expected in the educational theatre process), and what is striking is the quality work and the sense of ensemble cooperation; these people, divergent as they are in talent, experience, and personality, have discovered and demonstrate the "magic" of theatre. We trust we'll see more of them, and be able to watch them grow as persons and as performers.

Back-up personnel, of course, are essential these are the folks the audience doesn't see, but without whom there would be no show. There are too many to mention, but let's at least recognize Kara Cracraft as lighting designer, Sharon Wickerham as costumer, Greg Mebruer as technical director, and Shauna Thieman as production stage manager. As is almost always the case, and properly so in educational theater particularly, many people "doubled in brass," and added greatly to the glint and gleam of the show.

One interesting thing to note is the costuming. For Act I, everyone except the Bard himself is dressed in simple, unobtrusive black and white. For Act II, varied, but still tastefully simple, bright but soft colors are used, on a "marble-floored" stage a Seyer creation.

Such a neat introduction to and reminder of our good friend Shakespeare! Strange to contemporary ears as much of his Elizabethan language is, it forms the basis and tone of a great deal of our own thinking, speaking, and writing. It behooves us well to enjoy such a feast and express gratitude to University Theatre for whetting our palate so generously!

Brush up your Shakespeare, INDEED! and have a rollicking good time while you're about it!