Fixing King John by Kirk Lynn, Rude Mechanicals at the Off-Shoot, November 7 - 24, 2013

Cast of Fixing King John (photo: Bret Brookshire)

by Michael Meigs

Kirk Lynn's script isn't Shakespeare. Fixing King John is a tight, fast story with dialogue full of fucking obscenities, one suited not for PBS but maybe to HBO.

E. Jason Liebrecht creates King John as an edgy, angry, powerful capo with the force of Jimmy Cagney and the morals of Tony Soprano.

Director Madge Darlington puts the Rude Mechs' staging into the confined space of their Off-Shoot rehearsal studio behind the Off-Center at 2211A Hidalgo Street in Austin. Audience members -- no, make that spectators, practically participants -- arrive to find the big room already milling with cast members in casual contemporary dress. 

The seating is equally casual around the central space, which has the feel of a gym or a space for a cage fight. Risers on two sides of it feature a couple of high-placed rows of chairs for conventional seating with wide platforms below them, and across the playing space are wooden towers with plywood platforms to accommodate watchers. It's a makeshift settle-where-you-wish assemblage directly reminiscent of the Mechs' re-staging of Dionysus in 69 here in 2009 and 2012.

Lynn's reworking of the little-read (and less-acted) Shakespeare hjistory play, written about 1590 but not mentioned in contemporary accounts or published until the 1623 Folio, is a drastic but coherent restructuring. He reduces a cast of 24 characters to one of 10, and he so reworks relations and plot elements that even if you'd actually read this neglected work you might not recognize it.

And the language! Though Lynn's first draft methodically rendered the original verse into pungent contemporary speech, his revisions and remakings fixed it so parallelisms all but disappeared. Take this example, from the opening scene:

King John by William Shakespeare

Fixing King John by Kirk Lynn

Act I, Scene I, lines 1-25 CHATILLON Philip of France, in right and true behalf Of thy deceased brother Geffrey’s son, Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim To this fair island and the territories, To Ireland, Poictiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine, Desiring thee to lay aside the sword Which sways usurpingly these several titles, And put the same into young Arthur’s hand, Thy nephew and right royal sovereign. KING JOHN. What follows if we disallow of this? CHAT. The proud control of fierce and bloody war, To enforce these rights so forcibly withheld. K. JOHN. Here have we war for war and blood for blood, Controlment for controlment: so answer France. CHAT. Then take my King’s defiance from my mouth, The farthest limit of my embassy. K. JOHN. Bear mine to him, and so depart in peace. Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France; For ere thou canst report, I will be there; The thunder of my cannon shall be heard. So hence! Be thou the trumpet of our wrath, And sullen presage of your own decay. An honorable conduct let him have. Pembroke, look to’t. Farewell, Chatillion. Exeunt Chatillion and Pembroke.

Act I, Scene I Everything you see is KING JOHN'S castle. And lookit,KING JOHN is on his throne. He looks gooood. He's thehome team along with his mom, QUEEN ELINOR, and PEMBROKE, and anyone else you see. Anyone except that slick DAUPHIN, who's on a visit from France. [. . . skipping to pg 2, from line 5] DAUPHIN [. . .] my father sent me here to tell you this:Step aside! Stop pretending to be the great King of England, because really—truly it’s your nephew, Arfur, who has the most reason to pretend that game. Whoop! We're telling you to step aside and let Arfur be the next King - of England, Ireland, Poitiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine and all that. All that. And now forget I was the King of France, pretending - and now pretend I’m every single one of the citizens who live in every single one of those shitholes in your kingdom I just listed, paying taxes, sleeping, making love on one another, dying and all that and listen as we say to you: Take off your hat. Take off your hat and put it on Arfur’s head. We’ll all be happier when you do. KING JOHN If Arfur wants my crown he’s gonna hafta come back from the grave and chop off my head to get it, ‘cause I’ll kill a motherfucker today just for scheduling a thought like that tomorrow. Fuck Arfur. Tell Philip that. Then what? DAUPHIN Total fucking all-out war. Whoop, whoop! And it’s not just gonna be people dressed in high fashion from France coming at you with army swords. No. Cuz we’re not trying to take the throne from England. We’re just trying to give it to the best English guy for the job. So you’re gonna have people attacking you that dress like you, and talk like you, and look like you, and cousins, and nephews, and sisters, and anybody who ever disagreed with a tax, or a law, or a decree they didn’t like coming after you. So you can see, that’s a hard fucking war to win. KING JOHN All right. You tell France I just said, ‘All right.’ What’s that in French? Just to say, ‘Great. Let’s do it. Fuck you. No big deal.’ I ain’t afraid to kill French people. I ain’t afraid to kill ANYBODY that comes after me. Say that to Philip. Like, no big deal. All right. What’s that in French? Like, ‘No biggie.’ You gotta a phrase for that? DAUPHIN Look in my mouth. You imagine you’re a great King? You got a good imagination. Look in my mouth and see my king’s response pouring out at you like a sewer. The nastiest shit you can imagine just pumping from my heart, up outta my mouth all over your stupid costume and your fake throne and filling up this fucking wayside inn you call a castle till you drown in our bile. Fuck you, too. KING JOHN I want you outta my country quick like lightning, and by the time you get home to your little fucking poodle farm you’re gonna hear the thunder of my cannons blowing up your home, your mom, your dad, your brothers and sisters, your dog. BOOM. You’re like the tip of the sword I’m gonna put in King Philip's mouth and keep pushing ‘til he feels the hilt of it on his chin. Pembroke? PEMBROKE Well said. KING JOHN Shut up, Pembroke. I'm gonna trust you with this snake.Make sure he gets aimed straight back to France, as quick as can be. And Dauphin? Remember what I said. 'Let’s do it. Fuck you. No big deal.' See you later, DAUPHIN. See you later, PEMBROKE.

Lynn describes his composition process in a thoughtful note in the program, and on their website the Mechs in their characteristic irreverent, ironic style state, "In some ways, we're offering you a more authentic experience of what a new Shakespeare play might be like than an actual Shakespeare play. In other ways, not so much." After all, Elizabethan playwrights borrowed liberally from one another and freely reworked earlier works; G.B. Harrison identifies Shakespeare's source as a two-part anonymous work printed in 1591 titled The Troublesome Raigne of John King of England and reprinted in 1611 with the addition of the words 'Written by W. Sh.' -- "a dishonest attempt to pass it off as Shakespeare's work." (Maybe much of it was Shakespeare's work, considering that Harrison writes at length about the uneven quality of the accepted text of King John.)

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: Ordinary Peephole, the Songs of Dick Price, private residence, January 20 - 30, 2013

The Dick Price Fan Club proudly presents

ORDINARY PEEPHOLE: The Songs of Dick Price

January 20-30. Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 8 p.m.
Lyova's House in Hyde Park. Address disclosed upon ticket reservation.
Very limited seating. Tickets: $15

dickprice.brownpapertickets.com or 1-800-838-3006

Featuring Adriene Mishler, Mark Stewart, Jay Byrd, Matt Hislope, and Lyova Rosanoff on the piano

Music and Lyrics: Dick Price
Direction: Matt Hislope
Musical Reconstruction: Lyova Rosanoff

"What happens when a funny person becomes a provocateur? You find yourself a little stunned at the things you're laughing at, then you look for other people to laugh with you." --Austin Chronicle

Take a look though an ordinary peephole and discover a full evening of songs by Austin's great novelty songwriter Dick Price. This marks the first time most of these songs have been performed by anyone except Dick himself. Spanning over three decades of songwriting, this living room cabaret includes such twisted ditties as "Knife and Fork," "Father Sambuco," "Happy Dinosaur," and "I Know Who You Are, I Saw What You Did." It's an intimate, irreverent, and long overdue tribute to one man's musical madness.

About Dick Price

Dick Price has written more than a thousand songs. He began composing music at the age of six, won 1st place in a state composition contest at age 12, and perfected his uniquely witty style in his late twenties. After attending the University of Texas and then living in New York City for a spell, Dick returned to Austin and launched the popular Dial-A-Tune service. Dick's songs have been heard worldwide on the Dr. Demento radio show and on many a mix tape passed between friends. With Rubber Repertory, he created the award-winning shows At Home with Dick and At Home with Dick 2.

About Lyova Rosanoff

Lyova Rosanoff was raised in New York City in a family of professional cellists. After graduating from Vassar she accepted a job with the San Antonio Symphony and has made her home in Texas ever since. She has taught at San Antonio College and the University of Texas at Austin, and was one of the founding members of Esther's Follies, where she served as Musical Director for 28 years. Elected to the Austin Arts Hall of Fame in 2003, she went on to co-write a humorous, Texas-tinged version of "Die Fleidermaus," which was premiered in 2008 by Austin Lyric Opera.

Vodka, Fucking and Television by Maksym Kurochkin, Breaking String Theatre, November 29 - December 15

by Dr. David Glen Robinson

This play, written in 2003, may reach an apex in the new generation of Russian plays. Breaking String Theater Company is getting used to this Russian art explosion, having produced a number of Russian plays in translation, and producing this extremely well written comedy with an exceptional ensemble of some of Austin’s most talented actors. Liz Fisher directs Vodka, Fucking and Television for Breaking String.

The only speed bump in the raceway to success for this sparkling vehicle is the obscenity in the title, which seems to have inhibited some of the more conventional marketing modes. No problem. Judging from the enthusiastic audience on opening night, word of mouth alone will counteract the dearth of posters in grocery stores.

The story behind VF+T is that of Russian theatrical creativity since the fall of the Soviet Union. The conduit for funneling the best new plays into English translations and on into the English-speaking world has been John Freedman, theatre writer for the Moscow Times. Graham Schmidt, Breaking String’s producing artistic director, describes Freedman as the rare man in the right place at the right time: he was visiting Moscow on a Fulbright to write his doctoral dissertation on Russian playwright Erdman when the Iron Curtain fell. Freedman moved to Russia, and the rest is ongoing cultural arts history. Freedman has been instrumental in bringing Maksym Kurochkin to the attention of the West. For more on this story, read Michael Meigs’ profile of VF+T and Liz Fisher for AustinLiveTheatre.com.

VF+T takes its title from the three vices that beset a 33-year-old writer and Red Army veteran variously referred to as Hero, Poet or Writer. His name is just as symbolic as are those of the other characters. He is Everyman (artist variant), portrayed by Noel Gaulin. In one of the most effective play openings that I have seen in the curtainless postmodern era, the house opens with Gaulin already onstage in pajamas and robe in the midst of his small but serviceable Moscow flat. The interior design is definitely post-Soviet Union; the room has central heating. 

Gaulin spins and contorts in apparent writer’s block, his grimacing face lit mostly by the laptop screen mocking him with its emptiness. The vices have a peculiar presence in the apartment, too: the flat-screen TV blares, and, pity Russia, its daytime TV is worse than ours (unfortunately, a good third of the audience misses the flat screen amusements because a table and pile of blankets block them). The kitchen sink if full of dirty dishes and used drinking glasses and bottles of vodka and wine are everywhere. The bed clothing and scattered blankets and comforters convey the tumbled look of recent sex, hinting perhaps at more to come.

Hero struggles and eventually declines into a a giant hallucinatory spasm. The personified vices materialize and swirl around him. The vices loudly claim triumph over the writer, backing him into every corner in the flat. Clutching for control, Hero declares that he will reclaim mastery if he can banish at least one of the vices from his life.

The rest of the play is a kind of reverse Judgment of Paris. Hero insists that each vice must make its best case for staying in his life, and he says he will expel the vice with the least compelling argument. Of course, aided by addictive denial, all the vices make great cases for themselves. The ensuing speeches are a showcase of Kurochkin’s writing skill, and they all jab and torture Hero’s weakening psyche.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: The Becomings, Popworks at the Golden Apple, June 27 - 29

Popworks is excited to present a workshop production of

THE BECOMINGS

with

Cyndi Williams, Jeffery Mills, Adriene Mishler, Rosalyn Mandola, Jennymarie Jemison, Kelli Bland and Robert Pierson as The Bear

Step Inside The Golden Apple: JUNE 27th-JUNE 29th, 8PM
LATE NIGHT JUNE 29TH, 10PM
*limited seating*
RESERVE YOUR TICKETS HERE! Free advance tickets via Brown Paper Tickets.

ARRIVE EARLY TO CLAIM YOUR TICKET.
TICKETS THAT ARE NOT CLAIMED BY 7:45 WILL BE SOLD TO PRESENT PARTIES ON THE WAIT LIST.
TICKETS $8 at the door
CASH OR CHECK ONLY PLEASE

* * free parking in lot! * *

"Do you feel bad for a mom who turns into a monster and is destroyed? It seems like fate to me, and fate's got no pity. But man, you gotta feel bad for those kids. Because Matricide is pure Curse-Starter, for sure.

Maybe though tonight, things might change. There's a ritual for that. But it's gotta be just right. "

Trapped under a terrible curse, a deeply troubled family and minor showbiz clan withers away. Convinced their long dead mother is haunting them, they are paralyzed with fear, ashamed of her death, and stuck at their last gig, The Golden Apple. But a secret coiled as tight as theirs is bound to spring. An outsider crashes thru their careful silence and the spring is tripped. The truth can open a door, but it can also kill a man. What remains after the falsehoods - tiny and tragic - come crumbling? And what happened that fateful night to send the family reeling?


From some of the people that brought you THE ASSUMPTION comes the story of a troubled and ridiculous family. Part greek tragedy, part 60's girl group musical, part Grey Gardens, THE BECOMINGS is the next venture for the fledgling collaborative experiment that is POPWORKS. This stellar company of performers shares the stage with a live-band with Justin "The Judge" Bankston (formerly of Winslow) playing original music from Sally Crewe, The Bandana Splits, Sonnet Blanton, Alejandro Rose-Garcia of Shakey Graves, and house band, Fast Moustache.

Direction Sonnet Blanton
Music Direction & Arrangement Justin Bankston and Alejandro Rose-Garcia
Production Management Sam Webber
Words: Blanton, Mills, Williams
Movement: Adriene Mishler

"People who have survived the cruel fate of tragedy do not make sweet stories well. They come across all funny. Hollow. Crooked. Like a smile hides the dark words you struggle to keep trapped behind your teeth. Our stories - Our story holds so much dark. But there is power in the dark. There is unsuspected depth."

poster design by Gabe Vaughn

Upcoming: Rapunzel, Scottish Rite Children's Theatre, August 27 - October 2

Received directly:

presents

Rapunzel

adapted and written by D.H. Thompson

directed by Adriene Mishler

August 27-October 2
Saturdays: 10:00 AM and Sundays: 2:00 PM
Scottish Rite Theatre, 207 West 18th at Lavaca (click for map)

$8 Children (ages 1-12) • Adults • $4 Babies under 1 year
Purchase online: srct.org or by phone: 512-472-5436
Buy tickets at Box Office: 207 West 18th Street (Monday-Friday, Noon - 4:00 PM)

Princess Rapunzel flees into the woods to escape her over-zealous suitor, Prince Francis and stumbles upon an old witch’s garden filled with yummy vegetables. Hungry, Rapunzel devours the veggies and discovers they are magical–with age reversing powers! Furious, the witch demands Rapunzel long golden hair as payback and snips off a lock, only to find the tresses are now magical too! Meanwhile, back at the castle, Francis’s long-lost, identical twin – Prince Ronald – has returned from traveling the world in search of true love. See how the story unfurls in this interactive variation of the classic Grimm’s fairytale for ages 4-10.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Flying by Olga Mukhina, Breaking String Theatre at the Off Center, January 28 - February 19

ALT's first take, for NowPlayingAustin's "A-Team":

Olga Mukhina’s Flying is a fast, dangerous and exhilarating ride.

Graham Schmidt and Breaking String Theatre put audiences up close to the beautiful youth of post-Soviet Russia in this 2004 piece. Olga Mukhin Qa one of those who originated the “New Drama” that came raging into Russia's mid-1990’s. It plays until February 19 at the Off Center, 2211-A Hidalgo Street (behind Joe’s Bakery on 7^th Street).

Heedless, hedonistic and rootless, a gang of six young professionals address one another only by their remarkable nicknames. Snowstorm, Blizzard, Snowflake, Maniac, Orangina and Lenochka strut, talk, preen and play hard. They revolve about one another and thrust themselves through the drab Moscow nights like shooting stars. Director Schmidt, choreographer Adrian Mishler and composer Justin Sherburn give this story a kinetic power that leaves the audience breathless at the end of the first half.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: Baal by Bertolt Brecht, Paper Chairs at Salvage Vanguard Theatre, November 11 - 28

Received directly:

Paper Chairs excitedly announces its sophomore production

Baal

by Bertolt Brecht, translated by Peter Tegel from the 1922 edition

directed by Dustin Wills.

Ba·al [bey-uhl, beyl]

1. any of numerous local deities among the ancient Semitic peoples, typifying the productive forces of nature and worshiped with much sensuality.

2. (sometimes lowercase) a false god.

The slightly intoxicated, morally bankrupt patrons of “The Night Cloud” are putting on a play about their idol, Baal. Baal is a mysterious figure said to have roamed the forests, inns and bars leaving nothing but poetry, destruction and a hefty bar tab in his wake. The perfect – though some may disagree – idol for a band of hooligans in a seedy cabaret.

Bertolt Brecht’s first play, Baal, drags its audience deep into a body of youthful desires and complete moral abandon. Written in 1918, when Brecht was 20 years old – before the Epic Theatre and the overtly political work for which he is lauded – Baal unfolds in fragments; like a piecemeal of the nearly forgotten events of a drunken evening. It tells the story of our poet-musician and title character, Baal, fleeing the civilized world to live the extreme life somewhere in the forest finding plenty of people and pursuits to indulge his insatiable appetite for experience. The themes coursing through this text are especially pressing today: emerging adulthood, substance abuse, nature’s destruction, homosexuality, and exploration of the body. This performance of Baal also features original score and 8 songs written to Brecht’s verse performed live by the bar patrons and composed and directed by boozers Andy Tindall and Rob Greenfield. We also invite 12 audience members to buy priority seats at tables on stage – free refreshments included!

Featuring bar patrons Joey Hood (2010 Critic’s Table Best Actor), Robert Pierson, Jacob Trussell, Noel Gaulin, Michael Amendola (2010 Critic’s Table Best Supporting Actor), Rob Greenfield, Kelli Bland, Adriene Mishler, Elizabeth Doss, Kimberly Adams, Chase Crossno, Sonnet Blanton, and Gabriel Luna (2010 Critic’s Table Best Actor) in the title role, Baal. The Night Cloud Cabaret is designed by Lisa Laratta (2010 Critic’s Table Best Scenic Design), the costumes by bar regular Benjamin Taylor Ridgeway, and the lovely Natalie George hanging lights from the trees.

Baal runs Wednesdays – Sundays from November 11 to November 28 nightly at 8:00 p.m. (three weekends in total) at The Salvage Vanguard Theater (2803 Manor Rd.; Austin, Texas 78722). Tickets: Pay-What-You-Want Wednesdays and Thursdays; Fridays-Sundays - $15.00 general seating, $30.00 table seating. Advanced Purchase ticket pricing ($15 each) will be available through our website as of October 18, 2010 (www.paperchairs.com). There will be no performance Thanksgiving, November 25.

Paper Chairs creates sensorially dynamic theatre combining fractured subjectivity, music, unconventional audience situation, surrealism, provocative design and labor-intensive mechanics. We favor challenging texts that allow for a fusion of various performance styles, music genres, and historical periods to excite modern sensibilities and educate by suggesting past and present cultural connections. The work is outrageous, well-researched, and a little bit dangerous.

Upcoming: Silent Stage, A Live Action Silent Film, Episode 1, Undisclosed Location in Austin, February 19 - 28

UPDATE: Review by Virginia Hickenlaible for the Daily Texan, February 24

UPDATE: Robert Faires' short feature for the Austin Chronicle, February 18

Received indirectly:


The@re Ranch announces its inaugural theatre event


Silent Stage, A Live Action Silent Film
Episode One: Little Girl, Big City
at an undisclosed location
Thursdays-Saturdays, February 19 - 28, 8 p.m.

Quietly – no, silently - creep down the narrow alleyways of nowhere into a midnight party, something illicit and illegal, something magical and macabre. Silently sneak through the back of a 1920’s silent movie house – through the window, the chimney, the basement – get in at any cost.

Silent Stage's full length episode “Little Girl, Big City” follows the small town Dakota darling from the tumbleweed train platform to the seedy underbelly of Little Italy, NYC. Once in the city’s clutches: a mix up, a switch, a change of clothes, a handgun, a dream, a con artist, a flood, a big love.

Silent Stage features Dustin Wills, Westen Borghesi, Adriene Mishler, Sam Webber, Mark Stewart, Kyle Lagunas, Hilah Johnson, Chase Crossno, Francisco Rodriguez, Keri Boyd, Sonnet Blanton, and David Yeakle. Musical Accompaniment by Ashville, North Carolina's Reese Gray (Firecracker Jazz Band, Squirrel Nut Zippers)

Silent Stage runs Thursdays – Sundays, February 19 – 28, nightly at 8 p.m. Location and additional information will be disclosed upon ticket purchase. Advance ticket purchase or reservation is required! Seating is limited to 21 spectators per performance. Tickets may be purchased at www.silentstage.eventbright.com.

In This House (Everything Is You), Salvage Vanguard & Tutto Theatre for FronteraFest at the Eponymous Garden, Januar 21-24

No, despite the enigmatic lines of the teaser, this is not a ghost story. It is collaborative imagination of memories tied to the faded upright eloquence of that two-story bed and breakfast residence in lower East Austin now known as the Eponymous Garden.

"Eponymous" because the Garden takes its name from the street, Garden Street, and perhaps -- it would seem appropriate -- from that neighborhood in Austin. It's just east of I-35 and a couple of blocks south of César Chávez Street. To find it, you drive east on Chávez and after you cross under the Interstate, at the next traffic light take a right onto Waller Street. The neighborhood has lots of small clapboard houses, of the sort that would have been homes for tradesmen and artisans back in the 'teens of the previous century.

The garden is not very much in evidence in January, but the pictures on the website suggest that the house is engulfed in blossom once better weather arrives. In its weathered pink-and-white elegance, 1202 Garden Street carries a strong flavor of earlier prosperity.

In This House is a collaborative work for which fourteen artists are credited in the single photocopied page of the playbill. Jenny Larson of the Salvage Vanguard and Dustin Wills of Tutto Theatre directed. Others are writers, writer/actors, and actors, both grown ones and child actors.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .