Shakespearean plays usually don’t involve clowns licking a baby in order to discover what flavour it most resembles. They also don’t involve a lot of improvisation.
Still, A Company of Fool’s production of A Midwinter’s Dream Tale, which combines two Shakespearean plays and re-imagines them, does exactly that.
The play, presented by the Great Canadian Theatre Company (GCTC) and directed by AL Connors, runs from Nov. 29 through Dec. 18.
It centres around two clowns, ‘Restes and Pomme Frite, who get lost in a forest, and end up in the Land of the Fairies.
They’re picked up by a fairy king named Oberon and his wife Titania, who are going through personal and marital problems — Titania has gotten pregnant while Oberon was away.
The play is loosely based on two Shakespeare plays, The Winter’s Tale and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but it’s written in modern English.
Margo MacDonald, who plays ‘Restes and is one of the original creators of the show, said Winterlude inspired the creation of the play.
“The owner of the Gladstone Theatre asked us to put in a show that could run in conjunction with Winterlude, and he said, ‘Shakespeare has a winter play, doesn’t he?’ And we’re like ‘Yeah, and it’s a terrible play to do for all ages,” she said.
“But then we thought, ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a great all ages play, and if we could somehow do elements of A Winter’s Tale, combine it with A Midsummer Night’s Dream, put the clowns in it, have some singing and some dancing . . .’ and it all just wound out from there,” she said.
After the success of the show, the GCTC picked it up for a second run, according to Connors.
“[The GCTC] liked it enough to make it part of their season, which is something you don’t often see happening: a local Ottawa show being programmed in the season here,” Connors said.
During a preview show, the GCTC showed two scenes from the play, including one where ‘Restes and Pomme Frite are tasked by Oberon to kill a baby.
Not wanting to kill the infant, they decide to name it, and ‘Restes comes up with the idea of licking it in order to name it after a flavour of ice cream.
“The whole show was actually originally written through improvisation,” MacDonald said.
For Connors, improvisation is nothing new. He’s the artistic director of the Canadian Improv Games, a national high school tournament in improvisation, which Margo is also involved with.
He said that improvisation gives the play and the audience something different and exciting every time.
“Having improv at your game is a wild card, it’s exciting because both the performers on stage and the audience are creating this scene together at the same time. We’re all discovering what this scene is about and there’s always the risk that it will fail,” he said.
“You don’t go see a NASCAR race to see cars go round in a circle perfectly for five hours, you go hoping there’s going to be a disaster,” he continued. “And improv is the same way.”
Despite the improvisation factor, Johnson said that fans of Shakespeare will be able to recognize his works in the play by various cues imbued within the script.
“There are not too many entire speeches from Shakespeare, but if you are a Shakespeare fan going into the show, there’s a bunch of Easter eggs here and there,” he said.
For the production, Connors said he has high hopes for audience reception.
“I have no doubt that this will be, and I say it, this will be the funniest play you can see in the history of time, for all eternity.”
