The Mission Statement
The Olde School Shakespeare Collective is a collective of actors/directors/artists driven to create theatre within a community-oriented aesthetic that emphasizes Shakespeare for the working class. We don't utilize a director; we direct ourselves. We rehearse our work once, and we perform it in a public house where members of our community can come, have a drink, Interact, and leave with a new notion of how theatre can be created and performed. We do this within a non-hierarchical theatre-making structure that places those doing the work at the forefront of our priority list. We are mad scientists experimenting with form using the theatre-making techniques of old to create modern responses.
We believe that what we have to offer is an antidote to the many complaints issued by the theatre community over the course of COVID: Lack of diversity, unequal pay, productions that don’t adjust to fit the times, outdated themes, companies that lack actual connections with the humans and artists within their communities, theatre companies that don’t listen, theatre companies who only listen to the highest paying subscribers, etc... the list could go on forever. We hope that you see these issues and complaints that you may have given voice to yourself and feel seen in some way. That is why we do what we do.
Photo credit: Jeff Kurysz
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