The Merchant of BUSY!

Over the course of this week I have been in a wonderful production of The Merchant of Venice at the South London Theatre. This is my third show at SLT and is one of the most enjoyable (although I do say that, each show I’ve been in has been very different with a variety of people and thus a unique and wonderful experience in and of themselves). For a brief synopsis of the show you can click here to be directed towards the SLT website.

In this version of the show I play Launcelot Gobbo, a clown character who is a servant of Shylock and becomes a servant of Bassanio. Launcelot has a famous speech (used for comedic auditions) involving an odd conversation. He explains to the audience that he wishes to leave the servitude of Shylock but does not know whether to run or stay. He has an angel and a devil on his shoulders directing him either way and reports the conversation he had with them to the audience. The staging of this speech always proves to be a little bit difficult but also very unique every time. Our director decided to portray this scene as an argument between myself and two sock puppets I wear on my arms. I’ve put a lot of physical acting into the roll to really embody the clown-like qualities of the character himself and having the ability to speak directly to the audience makes it even more enjoyable. The entire run of Launcelot throughout the show is quite funny (comedic relief during the whole “pound of flesh” thing) and it’s been going really well thus far in the run.

I’ve also done something in this show I’ve never done on stage before…sing. I’m in a song and dance number to begin the second half and I have to admit…I was a little apprehensive at first about how that was all going to go. After a lot of rehearsal and work I am very proud of how the song ended up. So much so that I am considering auditioning for a theatre company in Sutton called the Lyric Players. They have auditions coming up next month for a Spring production of “The Producers”. This is one of my favourite and funniest musicals and I would love to be involved in it. Although it may not happen, playing the part of Leopold Bloom (Matthew Broderick) would be one heck of a fun time.

I’m still mulling it over, but I’ll let you all know how it ends up in the end.