May the Bard Be with You

Last time, it was for brisket. Tonight, iambic pentameter.

Tonight the Weinstein JCC lured me in, not for food but because they were hosting HenShakes' one night production of "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. Abridged. Revised."

Abridged so we weren't there until our butts fell off. Revised so they could insert topical humor and current references.

Meaning an evening for the intellectually flaccid of 37 plays in 97 minutes by three of Richmond's finest actors: John Mincks, Evan Nasteff and David Janosik, with a whole lot of fake vomiting, sexual references and dramatic dying going on.

Because, you know, all the world's a stage.

They began with a stripped down version of "Romeo and Juliet" that had Romeo saying, "I wanna kiss you, dude" and Juliet waxing poetic with, "That which we call a nose would still smell."

When Romeo begins to muse, saying, "Call me but love," Juliet interrupts with, "Did you call me Butt Love?" Naturally this becomes her new term of endearment, as in, "Parting is such sweet sorrow, Butt Love."

While the three energetic actors spent a whopping twelve minutes on "Romeo and Juliet," they went much briefer on the primitive revenge drama, "Titus Andronicus," which they managed to turn into a cooking show because after a long day of killing, severing and cannibalizing, who really feels like cooking?

Hilarious.

Moving on, the trio discussed whether they should do "Othello" in black face ("Do you want to piss off Tyler Perry?" pause "Kind of"), finally deciding to don sunglasses and rap it while throwing gang signs.

Seeing that time was ticking, they chose to condense all Shakespeare's comedies into one with hysterical results.

David, easily the largest of the three actors, took all the female roles throughout the evening, including the heroine for the mass comedy.

In a blond wig and skirt, he used his most lilting voice to say, "Oh, Father! I am so young and pubescent on this island," as he skipped around the stage.

But in Shakespeare's plays, girls always pretend to be boys and when he/she comes on to our hero, he responds to her as if she's a he. "I swingeth  not that way, boy!" Poor thing, she never realizes she's bi-curious.

Macbeth required the trio to don plaid knickers and adopt thick Scottish accents (very well executed, too), funny enough but the dialog was even better.

I was from my mother's womb untimely ripped.
I support a woman's right to choose.

"Julius Cesar" lasted about 60 seconds before someone decreed, "On to my play," and "Antony and Cleopatra" got underway.

There was another onstage discussion, this time about the lost play "Two Mobile Kinsmen," except not really. That turned out to be "Two Noble Kinsman," one of the plays that is neither comedy, tragedy or history. An obscure play.

The only one of these the trio deemed worth doing was "Troilus and Cressida" because, as Evan said, "It's not crap at all."

He read a synopsis off his phone while David and John did an interpretive dance of the plot that involved wings and getting between Evan's legs.

"Richard II" and "Richard III" were done as a football game, with each taking a turn as the announcer, often sounding a lot like Howard Cosell, and saying things like, "Poisoned on the ten yard line."

There was a penalty for "fictional character on the field" when King Lear put in an appearance and he was disqualified.

They ended with a cheer, yelling, "Henry V, Richard the third, the whole royal family is fricking absurd. Go sports team!"

By now all three were looking pretty sweaty after countless costume changes, much running in and out of the audience and more sword fighting and death scenes than I could keep track of.

As if I was trying. It was enough just to keep up with the rapid fire dialog and shenanigans of the actors.

Then they realized that they still had "Hamlet" to do ("Oh, crap, Hamlet!") and John asks for a summary of it.

"A young prince struggles with his conscience after his uncle kills his Dad." Evan looks at him like he's crazy. "Dude, that's the "Lion King."

Wait a minute...

That's when intermission kicked in but afterwards only John returned. He tried to stall by showing us an index card with all 152 of Shakespeare's sonnets on it, saying Even had told him he couldn't cover them all.

He laid the card on the stage, and laid his hat over it. Covered, done.

The entire second act was given over to "Hamlet" with Horatio being called fellatio and "To sleep, perchance to dream" devolving into, "To sleep, perchance to nap, perchance to snooze, perchance to doze."

During Evan's important "to be or not to be" speech, he broke down about a dilemma on "Full House," a show her admits he's currently watching in reruns.

But it's when David does Hamlet's "Man delights me not" soliloquy that you could have heard a pin drop in the room, his voice and perfect diction feeding the soul of every Shakespeare lover in the room.

A volunteer was plucked from the audience (and called Bob despite her name being Julia) to do the screaming of Ophelia's id, but the audience was soon asked to join her in a group scream-a-thon.

Of course, David played Ophelia and to play her drowning scene, threw a cup of water in his face.

As you may already know, all did not end well there, either. That's why they call it a tragedy.

Just when the last of Shakespeare's plays had ended, the actors got even sillier.

First they did a two minute version of "Hamlet." Then a 30 second version.

Then, perhaps most brilliantly, a backwards version, with the classic line, "Be to not or be to?"

Moving backwards, undying and, yes, Ophelia spitting water out of her mouth to un-drown.

"You thank!" they yelled to the standing ovation the audience gave them.

Effort fine damn, gentlemen. Truly one for the books.

Abridged and revised. I definitely swingeth that way.