Author Archives: Shakespeare

La Shawn Banks Returns to NDSF to Play the Duke of Buckingham

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La Shawn Banks

La Shawn Banks will play the role of the Duke of Buckingham in this season’s Richard III. La Shawn returns to Notre Dame for a third season where he was last seen in Macbeth and The Comedy of Errors. Chicago credits: The Liar, Travels With My Aunt, Old Glory, The Turn of the Screw, Othello, The Duchess of Malfi and To the Green Fields Beyond (Writers’ Theatre), The Island (Remy Bumppo Theatre) Edward II (Chicago Shakespeare Theatre), Execution of Justice (About Face Theatre), A Year With Frog and Toad (Chicago Children’s Theatre) and five seasons of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol (Goodman Theatre). Regional credits: Twelfth Night, Richard III, Troilus & Cressida, The Liar, The Taming of the Shrew and Of Mice and Men (American Players Theatre). Around the World in 80 Days (Indiana Repertory) and the Amen Corner (Cleveland Playhouse).

Barbara Robertson as Queen Margaret

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Barbara Robertson

Barbara Robertson

Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival welcomes Barbara Robertson who will play the role of Queen Margaret in Richard III, August 20 through September 1, 2013.

Barbara Robertson recently did Julius Caesar at Chicago Shakespeare Theatre where she has also performed in Hamlet, A Little Night Music, Winter’s Tale, Kabuki Lady Macbeth, King Lear, and Antony and Cleopatra.
She’s received numerous awards. In addition to tours of Wicked and Angels In America I & II, and Kabuki Medea, Chicago theatre credits include: The Detective’s Wife; (Writers’ Theatre), The Goat or Who Is Sylvia?; Camino Real; House & Garden; Pal Joey; Black Snow; (Goodman Theatre), Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?; Mary Stuart; La Bete; (Court Theatre), Working; Love, Loss and What I Wore; Grand Hotel;(Broadway Playhouse), Pursued By Happiness; Secret Rapture; (Steppenwolf Theatre Company),Yeast Nation (ATC), Hard Times (Lookingglass Theatre Company), Emma’s Child (Victory Gardens). Film credits include The Company; A Straight Story; After Christmas; Hunter and LOL. Television credits include projects for NBC, CBS. Paramount and Disney. Barbara’s a member of AEA, SAG/AFTRA and teacher at Columbia College.

Off With His Head!

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Over the next few weeks we will be introducing you to the cast of our 2013 Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival. We begin with Richard, Duke of Gloucester –

Ryan Producing Artistic Director Grant Mudge is pleased to announce that Michael Gotch will be playing the title role in Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival‘s upcoming production of Richard III. Michael arrives having played the title role in Hamlet this spring under the direction of Tony-nominee Mark Lamos at The REP, where he is a 5-year member of the professional resident company at the University of Delaware.

Michael Gotch

Michael Gotch

Before joining the REP, Michael worked at many of the country’s leading theatres. Past productions include Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s world premiere of Jeffrey Hatcher’s Armadale and I Am My Own Wife. Off-Broadway credits include the U.S. Premiere of Svejk (Theatre for a New Audience), Richard III (The Acting Company), and Mercadet (Culture Project). His regional credits include Algernon in The Importance of Being Earnest (South Coast Repertory) directed by Warner Shook; Salieri in Amadeus (Actors Theatre of Louisville) directed by Kate Whoriskey; Jeff Award Nomination and After Dark Award for Chicago Premiere of Shakespeare’s R&J (Chicago Shakespeare Theater); at American Player’s Theatre: Julius Caesar, Timon of Athens, The Merchant of Venice, and Much Ado About Nothing, for which he received a Falstaff Award Nomination; The Taming of the Shrew, Richard II (Milwaukee Shakespeare). We look forward to Michael’s portrayal of this twisted king.

Richard III production meeting update

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IMG_1915At yesterday’s production meeting for the 2013 NDSF, Marcus Stephens presented a preliminary model for his set design and Jeremy Floyd presented some preliminary sketches for Richard III. I’ve uploaded some images of Jeremy’s sketches to Pinterest.

Intermission between the US and UK – a Hamlet travel blog

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Laertes, Horatio, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern all went, wrapped up in the shape of Andrew Fallaize, to New York City and stayed with a friend in The Village. The only news we have is: ‘It’s a blast!’ and something about martinis.

Hamlet is back in London and rejoined his Ophelia.

Polonius went back to his Mrs Polonius and their children, to whom he took back a veritable suitcase of trophies plucked from all corners of the tour – something from Indiana, Texas, Illinois, and Tennessee.

Gertrude and Claudius hit Route 66 in a Toyota – they took up the mother road in Oklahoma and followed it to California. In Malibu Canyon, staring over the Pacific ocean, they wrote down their ultimate mileage – 2,621

Here are some pictures from their travels, the captions are Shakespeare’s – the perspective is out of Hamlet:

1.‘But look, the morn in russet mantle clad Walks o’er the dew of yon high eastward hill’ (Horatio - Monument Valley, Utah)

1. ‘But look, the morn in russet mantle clad
Walks o’er the dew of yon high eastward hill’
(Horatio – Monument Valley, Utah)

2.‘Do it, England, For like the hectic in my blood he rages, And thou must cure me’ (Claudius - Grand Canyon, Arizona)

2. ‘Do it, England,
For like the hectic in my blood he rages,
And thou must cure me’
(Claudius – Grand Canyon, Arizona)

3.‘What shall I do?’ (Gertrude – North Texas, old route 66)

3. ‘What shall I do?’
(Gertrude – North Texas, old route 66)

4.‘Nay, I know not. Is it the King?’ (Hamlet - Lansky’s, Clothier to the King, Memphis) Now wears his crown’ (Ghost - Lansky’s, Clothier to the King, Memphis)

4. ‘Nay, I know not. Is it the King?’
(Hamlet – Lansky’s, Clothier to the King, Memphis)
Now wears his crown’
(Ghost – Lansky’s, Clothier to the King, Memphis)

5.‘The serpent that did sting thy father’s life Now wears his crown’ (Ghost - Lansky’s, Clothier to the King, Memphis)

5. ‘The serpent that did sting thy father’s life
Now wears his crown’
(Ghost – Lansky’s, Clothier to the King, Memphis)

6.‘Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris’ (Polonius – trolley car, Memphis)

6. ‘Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris’
(Polonius – trolley car, Memphis)

7.‘The steep and thorny way to heaven’ (Ophelia – Route 66, mid-point – north Texas)

7. ‘The steep and thorny way to heaven’
(Ophelia – Route 66, mid-point – north Texas)

8.‘the rank sweat of an enseam`ed bed’ (Hamlet – the Solarium, Mabel Dodge Luhan House, Taos, New Mexico)

8. ‘the rank sweat of an enseam`ed bed’
(Hamlet – the Solarium, Mabel Dodge Luhan House, Taos, New Mexico)