Buntport Theater delivers another original and creative comic gem in their musical send-up of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus. Buntport dismembers (pun intended) the Bard’s bloodiest and most brutal tragedy, filling the evening with slapstick humor, creative devices to help the audience follow the complex plot, bad puns, cliché musical numbers, and Monty Pythonesque blood and gore.
The production opens with a traveling troupe of actors (the “van-o-players”) that will be performing Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus. Even a brief summary of the plot would take far too long for this review, and have little value. Suffice to say that Titus is a bloody story of war, deceit, revenge, rape, murder, and limb removal, set against the backdrop ancient Rome. This production may be the most understandable rendition of this play you will every see, using a clever visual device to identify characters and filling gaps with occasional narration.
The seven members of Buntport, Brian Colonna, Erik Edborg, Hannah Duggan, Erin Rollman, Evan Weissman, Matt Petraglia, and Samantha Schmitz “adapted, produced, designed, directed, and built” this production as a collaboration. This group has developed an original, integrated piece of comic theatre. While the performances are very good, the careful construction of a complete package, including context, design concept and supporting devices, is excellent. The script itself is funny, but adding in the character identification board, the scenic element of the versatile beat-up old van, the creative puppets, the anachronistic musical numbers, and the eclectic costumes makes the whole exceed the sum of the parts.
As actors, five members of the Buntport ensemble shine as well. All five create multiple unique, recognizable characters, in some cases in rapid succession with only minor costume changes. Hannah Duggan is probably the strongest in the cast, transforming herself from the pathetic Levinia to the delightfully evil Aaron with the application of a fake mustache. As Levinia, after loosing her hands and tongue, she is hilariously ineffective as she tries to communicate what has befallen her and attempts to perform the most basic tasks. Evan Weissman shows amazing versatility, playing many characters, most of them (as aptly described on the character board) “someone who will probably die.” His bizarre facial gymnastics as Aemilius are particularly entertaining.
Ron Wilkenson vamps as the Emperor Saturninus, plays Titus’s son and grandson (both named Lucius), and controls the puppets representing Tamora’s sons Demetrius and Chiron. The choreography of the interaction of the puppets and the live actors on stage is interesting and effective. Brian Colonna opens the evening as the leader of the traveling troupe, and provides an anchor for the show as Titus, as well as covering the emperor’s brother Bassianus. Erin Rollman changes gender frequently, bouncing back and forth between the initially tragic and later cruel Tamora, and Marcus, brother of Titus, giving both characters depth and variety.
One thing that makes this show work so well is the integrated overall visual package. The design concept is reminiscent of Italian Commedia Dell’Arte, updated to modern times. The set has two elements, a character board and a modified old van, set against the backdrop of the exposed empty warehouse that is the Buntport Theater. The character board is a clever and effective device, serving two main purposes. It indicates which characters each actor is playing at any given time, and provides a running death toll, for which this play seems to cry out. Initially, the van seems benign – an offstage space for the performers to transform themselves, and a backdrop. But it is rolled (pushed by human power – by actors, no less) to expose four different sides, with each providing creative and bizarre props and set pieces, all of which nonetheless fit in the context of the overall production. And rounding out the visual impact of the play are the costumes. Difficult to describe, they are patchworks, cut and pieced together thrift store outcasts, fitting perfectly the idea of modern Commedia clowns. These are not circus clowns, but unique characters evoking the many dimensions of comedy.
This show is a hoot. It combines irreverence and skill, originality and tight execution, and cheap sight gags and cleverness. After seeing this show, I actually looked up Titus in my anthology of Shakespeare to check, and found that indeed, all the murder, mayhem, and dismemberment are right there in the script. It is no surprise that “straight” productions of Titus are rare – I can’t imagine a modern theatre company pulling off a sincere production. This is just one more reason to head to Buntport and see this much more entertaining version.
-Craig Williamson, January 20, 2005, North Denver Tribune