Like last summer’s Pericles on the High Seas, Titus the Clownicus is freely adapted from Shakespeare by company member Angela Berliner.
Sources of Inspiration
Shakespeare took his inspiration for “Titus Andronicus” from the gory theater that was played to bloodthirsty circus audiences between gladiatorial combats.
Ms. Berliner’s inspiration comes from the circus itself.
Titus the Clownicus is leader of the Red Nose Army. He returns home with his entourage of clowns and puppets, victorious after defeating the Green Noses in the Battle of the Clowns. But immediately he sets off to avenge the deaths of his sons, and the clown wars escalate.
Moral of the story: If someone is mean to you, don’t be mean back or everyone will just be mean for ever and ever.
Running Time: One Hour
The outdoor production, which has been condensed to run just under an hour, incorporates many elements already familiar to Gang audiences, including live music, masks, puppets, commedia and lots of spectacle.
Titus the Clownicus is the second production developed by The Actors’ Gang Children’s Theater Initiative, a pilot program funded in part by the city of Los Angeles Dept. of Cultural Affairs. In addition to professional company members, the cast includes students from Culver City High School and La Ballona Elementary School who have participated in previous Actors’ Gang programs.
A Personal History
Ms. Berliner is a playwright and actor who recently finished her M.F.A. in playwriting at UCLA. She has written several plays including Bender, Mosquito Bites, Little, the Apocryphal Acts, a co-adaptation of Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author, and the one-person show Blood Hungary and last summer’s Actors’ Gang production in the park, Pericles on the High Seas. She is a member of The Actors’ Gang, where she has been seen in many plays, including Blood! Love! Madness!; Tartuffe; Little; the Mysteries; Alagazam; Mephisto; Love’s Labor’s Lost and Drums in the Night.
A New Director
Actors’ Gang member Justin Zsebe makes his directing debut with the company with Titus the Clownicus. Mr. Zsebe began directing in Milwaukee where he learned to work on shoe-string budgets while adapting new works for the stage.
From there he went to Shanghai to work with Beijing Opera techniques and the eastern arts while sharing western thoughts and attitudes on acting. His travels took him to the port of New Orleans where he honed his directing skills working on playwrights such as Chekhov, Beckett, Mamet and Mee, all the time keeping in mind the fun and chaos that the theater of life has to offer.
Quarter-Century of History
The Actors’ Gang, founded in 1982 by a group of renegade theater artists, has more than 90 productions and 100 awards to its credit.
They consistently win acclaim for their daring interpretations of Shakespeare, Bruchner, Brecht, Moliere, Aeschylus, Ibsen and Chekhov, while also developing bold new plays that address the world today through a prism of satire, popular culture, and raucous stagecraft.
The Gang is currently touring nationally with Michael Gene Sullivan’s adaptation of George Orwell’s 1984, directed by the company’s Artistic Director, Tim Robbins. They recently completed international dates in New Zealand, Australia, and Hong Kong. Other Actors’ Gang productions that have toured to cities across the U.S include Mr. Robbins’ Embedded, Anne Nelson’s The Guys, and Jessica Blank’s and Erik Jensen’s The Exonerated.
A Little Background
The Actors’ Gang actively reaches out to the community with its Artist Residency in Local Schools program; special matinees for local schools; Accessibility Performances for the hearing- and sight-impaired; Pay-What-You-Can performances; and its free Summer-In-the-Park series for families.
For more information about Titus the Clownicus, call The Actors’ Gang box office at 310.838.GANG (310.838.4264) or go to www.theactorsgang.com
