Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at 8pm
Saturday at 2pm
This fall, Brave Spirits Theatre brings Alexandria, Egypt, to Alexandria, Virginia, with William Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra. Joe Carlson and BST Artistic Associate Jessica Lefkow star as the two lovers torn between their passions for each other and their duties to their countries. Performed by an ensemble cast of only ten, this epic story is produced in celebration of the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death.
Charleme V. Smith Director Jason Aufdem-Brinke Lighting Designer Jay D. Brock Viewpoints Consultant Madeline Burrows Percussion
Joe Carlson Fight Choreography / Movement Marshall B. Garrett Dramaturg Deborah Gur Stage Manager
Melissa Huggins Costume Designer Erik McMorris Set Designer Zach Roberts Music Director
Charlene V. Smith is one of my favorite young directors of Shakespeare plays. The artistic director of Brave Spirits Theatre based in Alexandria, Virginia, brings textual respect and theatrical wonder to her productions while layering in her own visionary staging skills. Most of all, she brings audacity to her work, a youthful exuberance, brash confidence, and a sense of adventure as she tackles both tried-and-true and obscure titles with small casts and small budgets in small spaces before small audiences.
Eric Minton, Shakespeareances.com
Lefkow’s maturity as an artist allowed her to create a capacious Cleopatra, a woman so effortlessly regal that even her petty jealousies (as when she petulantly fished for the compliment that her messenger “hath seen some greatness” against which to unfavorably compare Octavia) made her formidable. Lefkow delivers lines such as her rejection of Caesar’s flatteries — “He words me, girls, he words me. That I should not / Be noble to myself” — with forceful intelligence. To play a woman with this much complexity is a feminist act.
Musa Gurnis, Glassy Margents
Love is a battlefield in the vivid, high heat of Brave Spirits Theatre’s striking, fencing-match take on Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra. Once again Brave Spirits (BST) is true to its mission; bringing forth an ambitious, beautifully wrought, and passionate production of a classic play.
David Siegel, DC Metro Theater Arts
Brave Spirits Theatre has crafted an inspiring, amazing production. It is insightful and entertaining, not just for fans of Shakespeare but for anybody who wants to see powerful human emotions, lifelike and larger-than-life.
Joshua Engel, Theatre Bloom
This Antony and Cleopatra continues Brave Spirits’ streak of inventive, accessible, and very humane work.
