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Reduced Shakespeare Company founded in 1981 by Daniel Singer, who wrote a 25-minute,4-actor version of William Shakespeare's Hamlet, to be performed at the original Renaissance Pleasure Faire in Novato, California.
He cast himself as Polonius, Horatio, and Laertes; Jess Borgeson as the title character; Michael Fleming as Bernardo, Claudius, and the Ghost of Hamlet's father; and Barbara Reinertson as Ophelia and Gertrude.
When Reinertson broke her ankle three weeks into the run, Borgeson suggested that Adam Long fill in for her in drag. A wig was procured, and Long's performance was described as "uncanny." The show won high praise and developed a large following.
Borgeson returned to college in 1983 to pursue a degree in English literature, leaving Singer and Long to continue under the RSC banner. They penned a twenty-minute version of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, which they performed at Renaissance Fairs, on street-corners, beaches, and at private events. Crowds were amazed to see two men arrive with a small basket of costumes, two fencing foils, two bottles of poison, a rose, a dagger, a wig and a dummy, and proceed to enact the entire story with the zany style of a Marx Brothers movie.
Taking the advice of some fellow street-performers, Long and Singer expanded the comedy in the act and solicited for tips afterwards; their solicitations proved successful.
Borgeson rejoined the troupe in 1985, and so Singer's version of Hamlet was resurrected into the repertoire. Several actors had come and gone in the roles of Bernardo, the Ghost, and Claudius; the last in the series excused himself when his daughter was born.
The three-man RSC was born at that time, with Long taking over those roles. In 1987, a friend of the company suggested that they'd find a welcome reception at the famous Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland.
The ideal show length is about an hour, they decided they needed about twenty more minutes of material, and proposed doing Shakespeare's other 35 plays to round out an abridgement of everything the bard wrote in less than one hour.
The resulting script successfully premiered in an open-framed barn at the Paramount Ranch in Agoura, adjacent to the site of the Renaissance Faire. It then moved to Edinburgh proper, being performed in a church basement at 10:30 a.m. for a three-week run to sold-out houses.
After that, the show (expanded to 97 minutes) toured theatres and festivals around the world. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged) ran for nine record-breaking years at the Criterion Theatre in London's West End. It has become one of the world's popular shows, frequently playing in a variety of languages.
In the mid-1990s Martin and Tichenor wrote the company's second play, The Complete History of America (abridged). They followed this up with The Bible: The Complete Word of God (abridged). For the turn of the century, Martin and Tichenor wrote The Complete Millennium Musical (abridged). All the Great Books (abridged) was next in the early 2000s.
The company's itinerary has included stops at the White House, the Kennedy Centre, Lincoln Centre, London's West End, Seattle Repertory Theatre, American Repertory Theatre and Montreal's famed Just For Laughs Festival, as well as performances in Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Japan, Malta, Belgium, The Netherlands, Singapore and Bermuda – plus countless civic and university venues throughout the USA, Great Britain and Ireland.
THE TEAM
Adam Long, Daniel Singer, Reed Martin, Jess Winfield, Austin Tichenor, Alli Bostedt, Dominic Conti, Michael Faulkner, Jerry Kernion, Jeff Marlow, Jane Martin, Zach Moore, Davey Naylor, Mick Orfe, Elaine M. Randolph, Matt Rippy, Jenni Schwaner, Dustin Sullivan, Brent Tubbs.
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Reduced Shakespeare Company
19445 Riverside Drive,
Suite 132
Sonoma, CA 95476
USA
info@reducedshakespeare.com
http://www.reducedshakespeare.com/
Here are few videos reflect some of their work.