News: Theater for the New City Dream Up Festival to Present World Premiere of Bob Shuman's "Tongs and Bones Shakespeare"

Fight Over the Breeches; Gift of Louis E. Shecter, 1972, The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore

Theater for the New City, Crystal Field (Artistic Director), FFP, and Stage Voices proudly present the Off-Off Broadway world premiere of Tongs and Bones Shakespeare, based on footnote, or, 
generally, off-marquee characters, in the Bard’s plays. The theatrical quartet, by Bob Shuman, is directed by Frank Farrell and has been selected as part of Theater for the New City’s Dream Up Festival, August 25-September 15, 2024, curated by Michael Scott-Price and Crystal Field. 

Playing at the Community Theater in the Theater for the New City complex, the one-acts, included as part of the Tempestuous Amusements, Interludes, Noises, and Drollery are The Wanton Wind, based on A Midsummer Night’s Dream; From a Cloven Pine, a prequel to The Tempest; and The Coxcomb’s Wedding, inspired by As You Like It. Additionally, Farrell and his actors have agreed to provide a bonus reading of one further play, Disasters in the Sun, drawn from The Winter’s Tale. The evening is introduced by a surprise guest from Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own.

Frank Farrell has directed the one-acts with inventiveness and verve, bringing different time periods and unexpected locations and references to life. He also displays a progression of acting styles, from throughout the centuries, which include those from ancient Greek Theatre, the Delsarte 
System of Expression, and the filmic art in Fellini’s La Dolce Vita. Among others, musically, the quadruple-bill contains original work for a hallucinatory sequence and songs, by composer Ben Masterton, and recordings by the Congolese Afro-punk musicians of Kin’gongolo Kiniata, who fashion their own instruments from recycled materials, many times found on the streets.

Fitting in with the idea of Jerzy Grotowski’s Poor Theatre and Peter Brook’s Theatre of the Rough, “tongs and bones,” according to the Oxford dictionary, means “makeshift musical instruments,” used by people in public spaces “or in taverns” and it reinforces the idea of a down-to-earth Shakespeare adaptation, informal, and energized.

Created by vibrant, ethnically diverse artists, who give imaginative substance to what the quintessential dramatist had no more room for in his great plays, Tongs and Bones Shakespeare is not for purists, but nevertheless takes audiences on a captivating journey into his world and heart. Find out, for example:

What became of the Little Indian Boy in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?

How did Jaques, in As You Like It, lose his mirth?

And why did Ariel need to be freed, before meeting Prospero, in The Tempest?

Plus, more unexpected answers.

The Introduction invokes Virginia Woolf

Cast: Jennifer Kim

The Wanton Wind

The Wanton Wind portrays the secret lives of fairies, most specifically those of their King and Queen, Oberon and Titania. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare reports on the couple’s disagreements and brawls, and now their entangled relationship is vividly examined and brought to life, specifically, with regard to a child, the little Indian boy, left in their care by the votaress of Titania’s order. During preparations for a festive court masque, Puck appears with unannounced visitors, from far away, unleashing riot and mayhem into the world of sprites, animals, and “moonlight revels.”

Cast: Meghan Covington (Titania), Mychal Leverage (Oberon), James Dryden (Indian Boy), Jennifer Kim (Puck), Noni Alley (Fairy), Alejandro Flores (Visitors)

From a Cloven Pine

The great sorrows of the powerful Algerian witch Sycorax are revealed and enacted in From a Cloven Pine, a one-act based on The Tempest. Before Prospero landed on the mysterious enchanted island, there was a previous magician who lived there. Banished from her own home after becoming involved in the civil strife of her nation, she was then abandoned to the elements and fate (by sailors while pregnant). In an attempt to help her survive, a spirit, Ariel, offers rehabilitative efforts, only to realize the limits of what can be offered.

Cast: Emily Ross (Sycorax), Noni Alley (Ariel), Mychal Leverage (Sailor). Alejandro Flores (Sailor), Jennifer Kim (Spirit), James Dryden (Spirit)

The Coxcomb’s Wedding

The audience is invited to the union of Audrey, a country wench, and the jester Touchstone, in the Forest of Arden. Is he sincere or not? Is he too immature or privileged, as a courtier, to marry? Some might even espouse the belief that he has been sent to infiltrate the country community and report back to his lord, Duke Frederick. Considerations such as these plague the discernment and adjudication of Jaques, a second fool under allegiance to the banished Duke Senior, in the short play The Coxcomb’s Wedding, based on As You Like It. His decision, influenced by his own tumultuous past and conflicted conclusions, will expose the naked truth.

Cast: Alejandro Flores (Duke Senior), James Dryden (Jaques), Meghan Covington (Audrey, Forester), Emily Ross (Forester), Jennifer Kim (Rosalind), Mychal Leverage (Touchstone), Noni Alley (Martext)

Disasters in the Sun

Farrell and his cast have agreed to an additional format, for the Dream Up Festival at Theater for the New City, by giving a reading of a further one-act play by Shuman, based on Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale. Two Sicilian diplomatic envoys, and their servant, journey to the ancient Delphic Oracle 
to ascertain the truth behind the fidelity of the king’s wife. When they reach Greece, one in their party is involved in a serious riding accident, yet despite the setback, the characters intend to press on, lost in an unfamiliar Greek world populated by mythic creatures, both monstrous and divine.

Cast: Meghan Covington (Stranger), Mychal Leverage (Dion), Noni Alley (Cleomines), Jennifer Kim (Vassilios), Alejandro Flores (Apollo), James Dryden (Shepherd), Emily Ross (Reader of the Stage Directions) 

Tickets: $18.00

OPENS SUN., 9/1 at 8pm, RUNS WED., 9/4 at 6:30pm, FRI., 9/6 at 6:30pm, SUN., 9/8 at 8pm, WED., 9/11 at 9pm

For more information, visit https://theaterforthenewcity.net/, www.stagevoices.com, and https://www.dreamupfestival.org/shows.html (for tickets)

Theater for the New City is located at 155 First Avenue (between 9th and 10th Streets), New York, NY 10003.