Los Angeles Drama Club

Our players will meet and embody the most iconoclastic people in Shakespeare’s Canon! Characters who break the mold, speak up to the Power, smash their own stereotype, explode old paradigms, and climb an uphilll trail of courage, creativity and… controversy. Sometimes we don’t have the words for the injustice we witness in this life – but Shakespeare had them and his characters generously offer them to us today to borrow for any situation life throws us, no matter who we are, how young, how old, how poor, how powerful. And since every mold breaker needs an opponent, our Players will have a broad range of characters to explore. While exploring “two sides of a story,” the players will also be exposed to a myriad of Shakespeare plots and stories and will expand their knowledge of the Bard!

Many of Shakespeare’s plays employ the powers of supernatural creatures and events. From the prophecies and dreams in Julius Caesar to the Weird Sisters’ predictions to Macbeth to the resurrection in A Winter’s Tale, to the illusions and shape-shifting in The Tempest – magic was in the air during the time of Shakespeare – and you had to be of one mindset on the matter – or watch out! You might be dropped in the Thames to see if you could swim. If you can’t, you’re innocent of witchcraft. You likely also drowned. The use of magic and supernatural elements in 16th Century plays might not be as metaphorical as you think – to the people of the 16th Century, the supernatural realm was very real.