As Much a Love Letter as a Farce

Photo by Katie Sikora

Like a lot of potential theatregoers, my time is pretty crunched. I work all day; I have meetings most nights, and my weekends are never long enough to get everything in. So when I do make it to the theatre, I want to make it count.

That’s why I was so glad to see that Door Shakespeare was bringing The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged!) back for their 2012 season.

The Complete Works is an awesome exercise in both hilarity and time management. Clocking in at 37 plays (and a bunch of sonnets) performed in 90 minutes, The Complete Works trims down all the unnecessary nonsense that dedicated Shakespearian scholars have to deal with (e.g. the comedies) and gets right to the heart of what Shakespeare is all about. That is, if you consider the heart of Shakespeare to be sexual innuendo and vomiting.

Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t just Shakespeare for people who read CliffsNotes in high school. There are jokes that you won’t really get unless you’re a well-read student of the Bard, and The Complete Works is as much a love-letter to Shakespeare as it is a farce.

In other words, while watching the succession of kings in Shakespearian plays being re-enacted as an insane football game is funny regardless of your Shakespearian knowledge, it’s even funnier when you actually know who the heck is being tackled.

So if you like to laugh and you like (or even just tolerate!) Shakespeare, you should check out The Complete Works. I promise, it won’t be like sitting through high school English all over again.

Performed at Björklunden near Baileys Harbor, Door Shakespeare presents The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged!) on Thursdays and select Saturdays. They also perform William Shakespeare’s comedy As You Like It on Mondays, Tuesday, and Fridays.

For more information and tickets call 920.839.1500 or visit http://www.doorshakespeare.com.