Grassroot Shakespeare Co. brings authentic Globe Theatre experience to Holladay City Park
Aug 05, 2024 01:06PM ● By Collette Hayes
Barely rehearsed and highly improvised, the Grassroot Shakespeare Co. presented a captivating outdoor evening performance of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” at Holladay City Park. (Collette Hayes/City Journals)
Barely rehearsed and highly improvised, the Grassroot Shakespeare Co. presented an outdoor evening performance in June of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” at Holladay City Park. The 60-minute theatrical comedy, sponsored by the Holladay Arts Council, showcased soliloquy, humorous wordplay, and magical mishaps centered around dreams, all set to live music and special effects.
The interactive play encouraged up-close stage seating and actively involved the audience through a technique called direct address, where the actors speak direct dialogue to the audience. This active form of involvement made over 200 local community members active participants in the play rather than mere spectators.
“It was so fun to bring something unique to our community,” Holladay Arts and Culture Manager Megan Attermann said. “While the Utah arts community is well-saturated with Shakespeare, no company does it quite like this. It's so fun to see Shakespeare done with such energy and spontaneity. Some residents asked me if the company made up the funny lines. And I had to tell them that, while there was some spontaneous ad-libbing, 99% of that humorous language is exactly as Shakespeare wrote it. The Original Practice style of Grassroots really helps remove us from the false idea that Shakespeare was a meticulously produced event intended for elites and scholars.”
Grassroot Shakespeare Co., a nonprofit theater company, has held performances throughout Utah for 16 years. The theater company was founded by actors from Hale Center Theater Orem. Davey Morrison, a professional actor, director, and one of the original founders, continues to write grants to support the outdoor traveling Shakespeare play performances which are presented free to the public.
Educational Tour Manager and musician Gary Argyle joined the company in 2014. A guitarist, Argyle improvises the music for the performances by reacting to the show as a character would performing on-stage. His musical improvisation sets the scenes, emphasizes the drama and creates the encompassing tone. As Educational Tour Manager, Argyle schedules and organizes performances in school classrooms throughout Utah.
According to the Grassroot Shakespeare Co. website, “Most kids are able to follow most elements of the story without much difficulty. They understand the plot and what is happening in each scene. This is the result of the Original Practice methods the company uses. Some dialogue will be harder to follow than others, and some words are archaic.”
“What I find most enjoyable about the Grassroot Shakespeare Co. is the Educational Tour,” Argyle said. It’s a five-person cast and the actors play multiple characters so it’s way crazy and wild. The production provides the full story condensed into an hour show. We bring the top half of our performance stage into schools and perform in classrooms, auditoriums, outside or all most anywhere for an audience of five kids to thousands.”
In a recent conversation, cast member Steven Pond shared some insight into the behind-the-scenes production preparation. According to Pond, the acting company does Shakespeare like Shakespeare did Shakespeare. The summer tour includes a cast of nine, with actors playing multiple character roles and three musicians providing musical accompaniment. Rehearsals for each play are minimal and limited to five nights a week for two weeks. Interestingly, there is no costume designer. Actors are free to create the clothing ensemble that they imagine portrays the critical elements of the character, adding an intriguing and unique atmospheric component to the performance. An unadorned wooden set with a few necessary props serves for the stage; remarkably, there is no director. The cast works collaboratively and makes all the decisions about how each character is portrayed, bringing the best of several minds to the text instead of one.
“My favorite thing about performing with the company is the style and the way we practice. It’s the most fun I’ve ever had on stage,” Pond said. “I started doing Grassroots 12 years ago, and I haven’t done any traditional theater since. I love to interact with the audience the way that we do. You can’t have more fun doing theater than doing Grassroots.”
A previously scheduled venue for the next Grassroots performance fell through the following week. As a result, the acting company returned to Holladay City Park with a triple header performance of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” “Henry V,” and “Twelfth Night.”
“We are happy they thought of us to bring this triple header,” Attermann said. “They told me that they usually have 20-30 people show up for a performance in a new community. Holladay residents showed up. Closer to 200 people came!”
The acting company is versatile, providing various options for private parties, business parties and educational workshops in conjunction with its educational tour.
“Our educational workshop is great for company team building,” Pond said. “The entire production process is fully collaborative and getting into the style of how we do the show is a great team building exercise.”
For more information about The Grassroots Shakespeare Co., audience guidelines, and performance schedule visit grassroots-shakespeare.com. λ