Articles Tagged With: Eric Honour

Aparna Sri (left) as Lady Macbeth and Jaki Demarest (right) as Macbeth ???? Constantia Rioux

Macbeth at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews February 4, 2024 Amanda N. Gunther

“Such welcome and unwelcome things at once ‘tis hard to reconcile.” Macduff, ActIVsc.iii

I spent hours trying to find the way I felt about the current Rude Mechanical’s production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth only to have Billy Bard having already wrapped it up for me more than halfway through the show. This particular production is a balancing act of strong performances, questionable conceptualizations, impressive technological inclusions, mismatched aesthetics, and a barrage of death,

The Beaux’ Stratagem at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews March 30, 2023 Amanda N. Gunther

It’s all true— it’s all true— hilarity will ensue! Down at The Dew Drop Inn— you’ll laugh too— it’s all true! Now granted, my lyrical composition isn’t nearly as hysterical as Jaki Demarest’s when it comes to scribbling together crackpot-laughable words for the 70’s heehaw hoe-down spin-about that happens pretty darn close to the end of Act I with some of the blokes box-stepping ‘round one another in sheer nonsense-grade bliss. Wait— sorry— TIMEWARP!! Back it up— all the waaaay back to the 1970s,

The Belle’s Stratagem at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews February 2, 2023 Amanda N. Gunther

Men are all dissemblers, liars, deceivers! Or something like it, so says playwright Hannah Cowley, author of The Belle’s Stratagem. Not to be confused with The Beaux’ Stratagem, by George Farquhar (though if you stick around in a few weeks’ time, you may see exactly that show on The Rude Mechanicals’ stage!) Belle hit Drury Lane in 1780 whereas Beaux debuted quite a few decades before (and at Theatre Royal) in 1707.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews June 14, 2019 Amanda N. Gunther

Mendacity is the system we live in. Death is one way out.
Liquor is the other. Unless of course the crystal decanter top fuses into the
bottle-neck and prevents you from your liquor. (Try the screw-top.) Feeling a
little uncomfortable yet? A little like a Cat
on a Hot Tin Roof? Then you’ve found your way to The Rude Mechanical’s
production of Tennessee Williams’ other play, or his other, other play. Not the
one with the street-screaming for Stella or the one with all the little glass
animals and the jonquils and gentlemen callers,

Uncle Vanya at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews February 16, 2019 Holly Trout

Amanda N. Gunther | TheatreBloom

Uncle Vanya, written by Anton Chekhov, is the story of a group of people embittered by loss, disappointment, disillusionment, and hardship, and the power of faith through adversity. A retired professor, Alexandre (Bill Bodie), and his glamorous young wife Yelena (Erin Nealer) visit the rural estate that funds their city lifestyle. The estate is run by Vanya, (Nathan Rosen) Alexandre’s deceased former wife’s brother,

Arden Now at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews August 30, 2017 Amanda N. Gunther

A collaborative adaptation of As You Like It by William Shakespeare; this is the marketing tag for The Rude Mechanical’s latest production— Arden Now— which debuted earlier this summer at the 2017 Capital Fringe Festival. Now playing at the Greenbelt Arts Center for a two-weekend engagement, the doors have been opened to those unwilling or unable to attend the chaotic frenzy that is CapFringe, and the stage is a veritable carnival of concepts that don’t quite come together as Director Melissa Schick intends in her director’s note.

The Life and Death of Richard II at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews March 24, 2017 Amanda N. Gunther

Discomfort guides this servant’s tongue, you see

When first to speak on the venue known as the DCAC

But fear not, playgoers, for I share with you

Good news of The Rude Mechanicals and their show of Richard II

Laboriously titled The Life and Death Of

They present to you from one floor above

A judiciously rendered version that moves quite free

Of this early and poetic tale of history

Directed by Michael F.

Review: Henry V at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews September 1, 2016 Amanda N. Gunther

Suppose within the girdles of the Greenbelt Arts Center’s walls are now confined two mighty forces— The Rude Mechanicals: a community theatre troupe that delivers judiciously trimmed and readily accessible Shakespearean plays— and Henry V: Shakespeare’s middle Henry history play. Directed by Rebecca Speas, this muse of fire finds its place among the Bard’s canon in true Rude Mechanicals style and delivers swiftly the plot, the point, and the perfectly pared-down rendition of what is otherwise a lengthy history lesson in the trajectory arc of Prince Hal to King Harry.

Review: Henry IV Parts I & II at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews June 4, 2016 Paul Davis

Before Luke Skywalker becomes a man, he started out hanging out with an old man and a pack of ne’r do wells in a crap bar while his dad and more useful sibling were out there ruling the universe. George Lucas snagged a page from Shakespeare and made it his own into the form we know and love today. The Rude Mechanicals have taken this tumultuous two-part history of Henry IV about life,

Review: All’s Well That Ends Well at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews January 15, 2016 Amanda N. Gunther 1 Comment

Girl wants boy. Boy wants different girl. Girl tricks boy into wanting her. And they live happily ever after. Other stuff happens. There’s a fool involved somehow. And a king. And a fistula. That the girl magically cures the king of with her magical powers, or her herbs and whatnot. And then they live happily ever after. Also some love letters and a ring. Maybe some secretive identities, a ten-o’clock kidnapping, and a horse?

Review: The Life and Death of King John at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews August 25, 2015 Amanda N. Gunther

Ne’er so bethump’d with words has this critic found herself when staring down an amalgamation of a Shakespearean remount dipped in Pythonian humor and sprayed liberally with truncation across the Greenbelt Arts Center’s intimate black box stage, than she has in this very moment in attempting to report upon The Life and Death of King John as presented by The Rude Mechanicals. A history most boring upended ass over tea-kettle by Director Alan Duda,

Review: Macbeth- The Instruments of Darkness at The Rude Mechanicals

Reviews August 18, 2014 Amanda N. Gunther

Light and darkness make fools both of the eyes. But it is oft better to live in the bliss of darkness than in the harsh intelligence of the light for once a thing is known and learned it can never be unknown. The Rude Mechanicals illustrate this concept with exception as their bring their 2014 Capital Fringe Festival production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth: The Instruments of Darkness to the Greenbelt Arts Center for a limited five show engagement.