Alternative play rewrites "R&J"

A completely different version of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" opened on Thursday with the help of the Art Street Theatre, a theater arts company consisting of five SF State alumni.

Mark Jackson, a graduate of the theatre arts department, came up with the idea for the show in May. In July, he and four other theatre arts alumni improvised and wrote "R&J," their version of "Romeo and Juliet" and in August rehearsals were under way.

By September, they were performing their show at the 5th Annual San Francisco Fringe Festival.

"It was so cleverly done," Brian Peterson, an SF State English major, said. "I can't believe they wrote it and performed in it. I enjoyed it immensely."

The Fringe Festival is 11 days of performances that are up to one hour long and put on by 50 different theatre companies from around the world that have created and are performing their own shows in downtown San Francisco.

The beginning of "R&J" starts with Juliet killing herself. For the next hour, the audience sees her take a look at the last week of her life and herself.

The performance focuses on the actors and not the set, which consists of a violin and three chairs. There is a lot of body movement using botah, a Japanese form of dance retrieved from a theatrical workshop put on by a New York theater company last year in San Francisco.

In "R&J," the graduates use their body language to create a mood full of dramatic tension caused by the physical form of their movements. There are also amusing moments during the show when the actors use lines from Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" with a bit of sarcasm.

"It has been presented in the theater, but not always in the context written," Jackson says during a scene in the show.

With show titles such as "Sheboobie," "Beauty and the Beatnick" and "Groping for Justice: The Bob Packwood Story," the word "fringe" is fitting.

Jackson, who also directed the show and created AST, has performed for the Saratoga International Theatre Institute and studied the butoh dance with dance artists Maureen Fleming and Setsuko Yamada.

All of the other students involved in the show -- Gillian Brecker, Bricine Mitchell, Jake Rodriguez and Beth Wilmurt -- have been in previous performances outside of SF State.

"I saw the festival last year and really enjoyed it, but most of all I wanted to work with Mark," Wilmurt said. Wilmurt played the role of Juliet and has acted with Jackson in plays at SF State.

All fringe shows are being shown within a five-block radius at the Exit Theatre, Exit Stage Left, The 450 Geary Studio, Lorraine Hansberry Theatre and the Shelton Theatre.

After the festival, the AST is holding an acting workshop in Placerville on Sept. 16-17 to raise money for future productions.

The theatre arts department encourages students to get together and create ensembles after graduation so they can perform with each other in theater outside of school.

"We are very pleased a group of graduates are able to perform in the fringe," Joel Schecter, theatre arts department chair, said.

The shows are billed as a "theatrical marathon" by the organizers of the festival.

"It's theater gambling; you don't know what you're gonna' get," Jackson said.

Last year at the festival, Jackson's "Little Extremes," which he also created, was the number two show on the "audience favorites" list and received positive reviews from The Bay Guardian and SF Weekly.

The San Francisco Fringe Festival is accepting applications starting Feb. 18 for the 1997 show, which will be held Sept. 4 -14.

Schecter and the AST are currently working to have "R&J" performed at SF State on Sept. 20.

[ Golden Gater Online September 10, 1996 ]

[ Top of document ]