So here it is: "A Taste of Shakespeare in the Springs Preserve." Food, music, park museum, children's play area, amenities, and most of all entertainment all day long in a 270 acre nature preserve. Food provided by Wolfgang Puck, music by members of the Henderson Symphony Orchestra, and entertainment courtesy of Mr. William Shakespeare with a little help from his friends in Vegas.
It's over this coming Memorial Day Weekend, May 23-25, noon to six each day.
The Shakespeare goes all day long on two stages. Six foreshortened plays in rotation four times a day each for a total of 24 performances a day for festival goers to browse at their pleasure. So the next question is: what is a foreshortened play? First let me say my name is Dan Decker and I am the creator of this event. I do a little writing, books and scripts, (see: http://www.amazon.com/Anatomy-Screenplay-Dan-Decker/dp/096657320X/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238258439&sr=8-1) and a little teaching of script writing, (see: http://www.screenwritersgroup.com/) and my life-long passion is Shakespeare.
Shakespeare is the most produced screenwriter in the history of cinema, on everyone's Man of the Millennium list, and is credited with establishing the foundation of the modern English language which now predominates in the world. His writing is as vital today as it was 400 years ago when the ink was still wet. We honor and cherish the Compete Works as sacred to our culture, and we can also have fun with them; we can swim in the sea of WS' genius and never find the shores. A festival setting - food, music, outdoor stages, activities in every direction - offers us an opportunity for creative application of the classic texts to a fast-paced, modern, fun environment.
Here is my recipe for "A Taste of Shakespeare in the Springs Preserve": Take six plays, Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, Much Ado About Nothing, As You Like It, and Romeo and Juliet. Examine each one carefully and pick one central theme. Next choose two of the characters in the play whose onstage interactions best explore that theme. Now take all their scenes from the original play and hobble them together, do a little more cut and paste to smooth the newly-created narrative and what you have is a 15-20 minute one-act play using all the original language. These foreshortened plays actually convey a sense of the full play and their stories are intensified by applying techniques of modern story telling.
These foreshortened plays make for compelling and entertaining viewing and attest to the universality and timelessness of the original works. They represent the remarkable versatility and astonishing brilliance of the world's master writer, William Shakespeare.
Also see: Facebook: www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=56693908421#/group.php?gid=56693908421
MySpace: www.home.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user&MyToken=690a964d-f7fc-4518-a182-6b3450b05744)
KVBC-TV3 News: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz6o189ZAZs
LV SUN Newspaper: www.lasvegassun.com/news/2009/mar/03/taste-shakespeare-classic-theater-lv-twist/
