The crowd gathers quickly: an angry, weary mob still wearing their shabby work clothes, their dirty shirts and scuffed shoes. Dog tired but mad as hell, they mill around the door. Then, following some unseen cue, they begin to chant, “Jack Cade! Jack Cade! Jack Cade!”–the name of the leader of a peasant rebellion that nearly toppled Henry VI.
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This is Shakespeare’s Herd. Or most of it. This ragtag troupe of non-Equity actors gathered together by director Frank Farrell and assistant director Barbara Harris has been meeting every Monday for the last two months to indulge in a little free Shakespeare. Tonight they’re performing the last run-through of one of the bard’s seldom produced plays, Henry VI: Part II. Remarkably, the Jack Cade scene, which comes in the second half of the play, was never rehearsed. It was created spontaneously by the actors on the night of the play’s performance. Even more surprising, it was acted out backstage and was meant only to prepare the actors for their stage roles.
For the uninitiated, free Shakespeare is a technique that Farrell has been championing ever since he founded the now-defunct Free Shakespeare Company in the early 80s. His current foray into free Shakespeare, Shakespeare’s Herd, evolved out of classes on Shakespearean acting he taught at Center Theater last summer. “The whole idea of free Shakespeare,” he explains, “is to put on Shakespeare’s plays with no rehearsals and no director.”
And when things come together, as they did during Jack Cade’s rebellion the night I saw the run-through, the results can be amazing.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Kathy Richland.
