St. Louis Shakespeare
Under the direction of Doug Finlayson and Jef Awada, the acting level was very high, from Steven Pierce’s parody of Hamlet (just broad enough) to Maria Tholl’s Lady Macbeth, which was wrenching even when speaking lines in Dogg. Todd Oleson, a stern headmaster in Dogg’s Hamlet, needed to relish the menace more as the police inspector in Cahoot’s Macbeth, and John Wolbers — a very funny Gravedigger in Hamlet — lacked some clarity as Macbeth. Brian White was powerful as the dissident writer Cahoot and moving as Banquo. Amanda Williford, Melissa Rae Brown, Ted Drury, Corinne Germain and Patty Ulrich all played with great energy and fine timing. With a spotty Othello and a sparkling Dogg’s Hamlet, Cahoot’s Macbeth behind them this summer, St. Louis Shakespeare turns to the epic with a dramatization of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. WEST END WORD
....a highly enjoyable ride, buoyed by the antic disposition that marks Hamlet's feigned madness. We are treated to appealingly goofy sight gags galore, farce straight from Laurel and Hardy, kazoos and Offenbach. Eventually it comes time for the students to stage a truncated production of Hamlet. Have you ever had trouble following Shakespeare? If so, this is the show for you — because after twenty minutes of gobbledygook, when the actors finally begin their "greatest lines" rendition of Hamlet, the text is not only clear, it's embraceable. Shakespeare becomes our lifeline to security, which might well be the simple point that Stoppard is trying to convey. As directed by Doug Finlayson and Jef Awada, ten rambunctious actors (who are kept so busy that they actually feel like a lot fewer than that) run, skip and just generally flow through the 45 minutes. Then there is Phillip Bozich, who plays a befuddled outsider to the school (he's the character who links the two plays). Bozich is affectionately reminiscent of movie comedian Billy Gilbert, who enjoyed a career (Field Marshal Herring in Chaplin's The Great Dictator, the determined emissary in His Girl Friday) of making dumb endearing. RIVERFRONT TIMES
At Design Within Reach, a
disarmingly chic furniture store in the Central West End, you can buy an
ottoman or a pillow in a distinctive patterned fabric called
"Letters." The pattern is exactly that: an alphabet broken up to look
legible. But you can't read it; the pattern doesn't form words. It's simply a
design. Tom Stoppard created the theatrical version of that fabric years ago,
in an intriguing riff on Shakespeare and the spoken word called "Dogg's
Hamlet, Cahoot's Macbeth." Brainy, a bit arch and often very funny, the
two-part play is onstage at Shakespeare St. Louis under the crisp direction of
Doug Finlayson and Jef Awada.
ST. LOUIS POST DISPATCH
The comedies of Tom Stoppard have always been quirky and imaginative, intellectually stimulating but readily accessible, and wide-ranging in content. In the case of Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoot's Macbeth, a pair of one-act plays that comprise a single statement, all of these traits are in evidence, and the timely political relevance of the selection is a bonus. St. Louis Shakespeare is to be congratulated for their ambition in taking on the challenge and for the trust the choice shows in their public. KDHX