Fringe 2023 - Returning Favorites - Timothy Mooney Repertory Theatre

Breakneck Midsummer Night’s Dream

Shakespeare’s most beloved play! A dose of Renaissance Viagra! Three couples vault their way into the marriage bed via this whirlwind tale of Romantic Rivalry, Fairy Ribaldry, Love Potions… and an Ass!

Venue: Rarig Center Thrust
Tagged for: Comedy, Clowning, Storytelling, Physical Theater, Historical Content, Literary Adaptation, Shakespearian Elements
Content Warnings: Sexual Content

Here’s another Fringe offering I’m interested in because I saw a version of it online during the pandemic Fringe in 2021.

In this case it’s not the same show, but it’s the same conceit from the same artist applied to different subject matter.

Timothy Mooney is fully at home in the classics of Shakespeare.  Last year, in the first live Minnesota Fringe Festival since 2019, he joined us with Lot O’ Shakespeare, a completely randomized presentation of monologues from each of Shakespeare’s plays, plus six of the sonnets, chosen bingo-style.  But in 2021’s still online Fringe in the second year of the pandemic, he offered up the Breakneck Comedy of Errors, in which he played all the characters in a super-condensed version of Shakespeare’s comedy, and yet somehow it magically all still made sense and was very entertaining.

This year, it’s a super-condensed version of Shakespeare’s romantic comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream - but this time it’s onstage and he has some help to tell the story. It’s still only five more actors (two touring with him and three locals from the Twin Cities acting scene), so collectively they still have a lot of humans and fairies to cover between the six of them.  Having seen what Tim did all by himself, both in the trimming of the script and the performance of multiple characters all at once in Comedy of Errors, I’m expecting similar amusement this time around.

 

Here's some handy links to this year's Top 10, and Top 11-20 Lists, plus the full list of all returning favorites at this year's Fringe, plus a link to all the 2023 Minnesota Fringe Festival coverage.