Jonesborough Repertory Theatre welcomed The East Tennessee Shakespeare Festival as they presented
Bare-Bones Shakespeare. The Festival brought to our region professionally
performed Shakespeare debuting six performances in one weekend.
“JRT is so fortunate to have been chosen to host the festival,” says Kathleen Buttolph,
JRT’s Production Manager. “The actors’ performances are astounding.
The audience will be offered Shakespeare as it should be performed.”
Bare-Bones Shakespeare was conceived by Johnson City natives Christopher E. Dwyer and Bradley Foster
Smith. Long-time friends, they both graduated from Science Hill High School in 1999, then went their
separate ways to college -- Dwyer majored in Theatre at Lees-McRae College in Banner Elk, N.C., while
Smith studied film-making at Emerson College in Boston.
Their professional paths crossed in 2005 when the two young artists were cast in the educational
tour of the North Carolina Shakespeare Festival. “It was a terrific experience,” remembers Smith.
“Chris and I used to act in school plays and improv together, so we played off each other really
naturally.” The Johnson City boys were asked to return for the 2006 tour at N.C.S.F. “We've
performed for tens of thousands of North Carolinians,” says Dwyer, “but Brad and I kept having these
conversations about how much we wanted to perform for folks in our hometown.”
So they set out to do just that. Dwyer had already made arrangements with Kathleen Buttolph at
Jonesborough Repertory Theatre to direct his original play,
waiting on the moon, during Memorial
Day weekend.
“We convinced Kathleen we could stage a short Shakespeare program in this short timetable between
All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten and my play,
waiting on the moon,” says Chris with a
chuckle. Smith edited Shakespeare's plays Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet with three actors in mind. “We
had been doing the same kind of thing for two years, so we knew it was possible,” states Smith. “It's
limiting as to what you can show. You can't do the big angry mob scenes. But there are so, so many
great two-person scenes in the plays, and by selecting them carefully we distilled a very basic
storyline out of the plays.”
Hence the “Bare-Bones” approach. Smith and Dwyer set to work on designing a minimalist approach to
Shakespeare's work. "At the heart of Shakespeare's writing is this understanding of human character,
which is what makes his plays timeless," Smith says. “and also a lot of fun to watch,” Dwyer is quick
to point out. “Remember, Shakespeare wrote his plays to be performed in front of a live audience. He
was a poet, but he was also in show business.”
The two originally planned to cast one actress to play some of Shakespeare's most famous female
characters, but during the audition process they found two actresses they couldn't choose between --
so they cast them both. “They had such great innate qualities and a natural grip of the language that
we had to use them both,” says Smith, who quickly set to work expanding the script for four performers.
Bare-Bones Shakespeare will showcase Georgeanna Walden as Juliet and Queen Gertrude, while Ashley Bryant
will be portraying Juliet's Nurse and Ophelia.
If all goes well, Dwyer and Chris hope to stage more classical theatre in the future. “This is to
test the water,” Smith says. “We're planting a seed to see if it will grow. We feel East Tennessee
deserves a Shakespeare Festival, so we'll work hard to breathe some life into Shakespeare's text,
and hopefully it will resonate with the community.”
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