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Join us for a FREE public performance of King Lear, entirely unrehearsed! Come join in the chaos as 9 unscrupulous actors sweat and panic their way through 90 pages of Shakespeare's classic tale of unhinged royalty. You are encouraged to cheer, boo, hiss, offer good advice, offer bad advice, or just yell stuff! There's no fourth wall! You are free to be a tedious bawdry knave!
Preshow music and games at 6:30
Performance at 7 PM
Rock Canyon Amphitheater
King Lear is Shakespeare's ambitious work exploring the nature of age and wisdom, the fragility of power and the complex nature of familial bonds. In Grassroots take, you can expect the grotesque and bloody in celebration of the season! Make sure Grassroots Shakespeare's King Lear is a stop on your Halloween tour this year!
9/29 UNROOTED King Lear (Donation show/free)
Alexandra Vaughn has traveled through time and returned from a bleak post-apocalypse in order to alter history and save the world. She already did that though, so now she's just kinda... hanging out.
Being from the dusty, leather-clad, post-nuclear wasteland has given her an incredibly niche skillset and absolutely NO employment history. Luckily, we happened to be looking for a standoffish-yet-charismatic weapons expert with a heart of gold, so she's been palling with us these last few years.
In addition to working as Grassroots' fight choreographer and swordmaster, she's played several roles you might've seen. She was Romeo in "Romeo and Juliet" this summer, has played Banquo and Macduff in "Macbeth", and is currently with our educational tour as Helena in "Midsummer" and Ariel in "The Tempest."
Alexandra is delighted to bring her bloody expertise to this production of "King Lear" as the duplicitous Regan. She's also delighted to be able to eat real beef again, as cows are no longer extinct.
Grace is an actor on a noble quest for purpose, or at least a decent rehearsal schedule. Fortunately, Grassroots has thrown her a lifeline (no, seriously, she was spiraling). Just kidding. Mostly.
Grace recently graduated from UVU with her BFA in Acting and is now in hot pursuit of a Master of Arts. If you happen to know a master, please send them her way. Preferably one with snacks.
She’s absolutely thrilled to be joining Grassroots—where she will, once again, meet her untimely and probably very dramatic demise. Grace has died many times before: as Juliet (Romeo and Juliet), Beth (Little Women), and Rapunzel (Into the Woods). Please ready your tissues and your sympathy. She’s emotionally prepared. Are you?
November wanted the role of Edmund so badly, they held The Orb hostage from us. (As an all powerful deity, it quickly made its judgement upon them, stripping them of their most precious memories.) Their behavior was almost as treacherous as the bastard himself, so we gave ‘em the part. Now on their fourth Grassroots show, November looks forward to getting booed, and making some new precious memories with all their bloodied friends!
The Daniel is a large bipedal mammal belonging to the genus Actor. It is potentially the tallest living terrestrial animal and the largest sapien in King Lear. It is classified under the family Summerstay, along with its mate, the Rebecca. The Daniel's distinguishing characteristics are its extremely long legs, prominent mane, and poor fashion sense. Their food source is audience laughter, cast-mate praise, and leafy trees, which they browse at heights most other ground-based herbivores cannot reach. The Daniel has intrigued various theatrical directors for its peculiar appearance and behavior and has often been sighted in Shakespeare plays, comedies of manners, and adaptations of 19th-century literature.
"Mark: Eleila Bradford
Crime: five consecutive Grassroots shows
Details: Eleila has performed Shakespeare nearly her whole life. Her first show with Grassroots was Much Ado About Nothing, and most recently she played Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet and Aegeon in The Comedy of Errors.
Judgement: Exit, pursued by bear"
Let it be known that Alyssa is writing this bio against her will. She has written too many in her career, and is frankly sick of it. If you must know, Alyssa has been with Grassroots for like... 5 years. She is part of their Educational Tour, and was most recently seen in the summer productions of Romeo and Juliet (Mercutio) and Comedy of Errors (Dromio of Ephesus). Are you happy now?
Here at the Grassroots Shakespeare Company we do not believe in shaming our actors for not submitting their bios. We simply consult The Orb (TM) to determine what their bio would have said, had they submitted it. Here's what The Orb (TM) had to say:
Steven Pond is a 400,000 pound glob of goo that absorbs living things and adds them to their collective consciousness. Would you like to be a part of the goo consciousness? Great! You have no choice. The goo will slowly devour all things that have life, to the edge of the known universe, including your precious tortoise, Andrea. There is no stopping the goo, and why would you even want to? The goo has a great fitness club and a subscription to Masterclass.
Here at the Grassroots Shakespeare Company we do not believe in shaming our actors for not submitting their bios. We simply consult The Orb (TM) to determine what their bio would have said, had they submitted it. Here's what The Orb (TM) had to say:
Jaxon collects severed doll heads, each of which has a name beginning with 'Samantha.' Samantha Disco Werewolf, Samantha Haunted Armoire, Samantha Asparagus Fart, Samantha Half-Eaten-Hotdog, etc., you get it. When Jaxon is not naming 1/5 of a doll, they teach a class at the local YMCA on how to turn your antique wooden chest (full of severed doll heads) into an upscale Italian restaurant so you can make some CAAAAAAAAYSH, SON.
Here at the Grassroots Shakespeare Company we do not believe in shaming our actors for not submitting their bios. We simply consult The Orb (TM) to determine what their bio would have said, had they submitted it. Here's what The Orb (TM) had to say:
Katherine Moulton IS the notorious art thief Pierre Von Der Blootendorf, famous for stealing many, many priceless works of antiquity and attaching little mustaches to the people on said works. When Katherine/Pierre is not stealing priceless art, they stalk the neighborhood bird. Because that friggin' bird is up to something... I just know it. Look at that bird. LOOK AT THEM. That's a guilty freaking bird, right there. WHAT DOES THIS BIRD KNOW? Oh crap, you distracted me, where did the bird go? ... ... [shuffling of footsteps] ... ... [heavy breathing] ... Here little birdy... I know you're out here. OH NO, THE BIRD HAS A GUN WHERE DID THE BIRD GET A GUN OH PLEASE I'M TOO PRETTY TO DIE-- oh wait. It's a sandwich. My mistake. The bird has a sandwich. And now that I look a little closer, that's actually not a bird, but a Subway franchise. Welp, back to stealing Monet's!
The Grassroots Shakespeare Company is a 501-C3 non-profit formed in 2009. In that time we have dazzled audiences and shattered expectations about what Shakespeare is. We use grants and donations to bring performances to Utah schools and to bring our two yearly Summer Tour shows to parks absolutely free.
What does your donation do? Your donation helps us bring quality educational theater to schools all across Utah with our Educational Tour. It helps us bring free performances to parks all across Utah every Summer. It helps us keep ticket prices low for our few ticketed performances, and offer student discounts. It helps us find the highest quality talent by being able to pay our actors. It goes to helping us broaden our reach so that more people can finally understand Shakespeare and see it the way it was meant to be seen.
Even a few bucks can go a long way, so please hit that donate button and be a Bona Fide friend of the Bard!
Your donations are vital to helping us keep our company running and fulfill our mission statement! Even a little bit helps!
Grassroots Shakespeare differs from modern Shakespeare in a couple of key ways. When you see Shakespeare performed in modern times, it is much like seeing any other play-- people gather and take their seats and watch silently, perhaps occasionally clapping in-between scenes. However, this is not the way that Shakespeare was written. Shakespeare was written at a time when there was no fourth wall-- It had not been invented yet! This means that your average theater goer had no inhibitions whatsoever about telling the characters on-stage exactly what they thought about what was happening. Shakespeare knew this and actually wrote his plays with the audiences reactions in mind, even to the point that many lines which appear not to be in iambic pentameter actually are so once the audiences response is present! In Grassroots productions, our actors will speak most dialogue out to the audience, using a technique called 'direct address.' This makes the audience go from being mere spectators to active participants in the play.
Original Practice is when you remove that fourth wall, going back to the Elizabethan theater experience! While this is one of the main thrusts of the Original Practice experience, it is not the only one. Original Practice also means that their is no director. In Shakespeare's day, the play was put on collaboratively by the actors. Likewise, our casts make all of the decisions for their characters themselves-- with the help and council of their castmates. While this means you won't get a singular vision that a director might bring, it does mean that you get the best ideas to bring the text to life from many minds instead of one.
No costume designer! In Shakespeare's day, all costumes were created by the actors for their own characters. Additionally, in Elizabethan times, there was no period costuming-- actors wore whatever conveyed key elements of their characters best, with no special regard to time period or place. Likewise, you might see our 'Prince' from "Romeo and Juliet" as a bicycle cop, or 'Tybalt' as a 1950's greaser.
No set! In Shakespeare's time, there was no set, just a wooden stage adorned with only a few practical measures, like a log to sit on or perhaps a wand to lull characters to sleep.
Genderblind casting-- In Shakespeare's time, women weren't allowed on stage! That's right-- All women characters were actually played by men! In that same spirit, in a Grassroots show, women will play men, men will play women and everything in-between!
A shorter rehearsal period? That's right-- Shakespeare's troupe, The Kings Men, would memorize their lines beforehand and meet sometimes only the day before to go over fights and dances. At Grassroots, our rehearsal period is kept minimal to allow for spontaneous choices and authentic reactions. This is also an important part of the actor-audience collaboration-- every show is going to be different because the audience will be different-- there is little to be gained from hours of rehearsal if the audience is going to cause an actor to make different choices than they made in rehearsal!
Our talented cast hard at work to bring you another quality Grassroots production. Music by Gary Argyle.
William Shakespeare (Othello)
For inquiries about our upcoming events, send us a message.
We will get back to you soon!
For inquiries about our Educational Tour or to book us for your school, institution, library or event, contact: