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Life Arts    H3'ed 10/31/21

A Feast o' Southern Fried Shakespeare

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Meryl Ann Butler
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Robert James, Southern Fried Shakespeare
Robert James, Southern Fried Shakespeare
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Today OpEdNews is visiting with Robert James, an Atlanta-based actor, singer/songwriter, and playwright who trained in Los Angeles. Recently he was awarded Best Actor at an Industry showcase, and he is known for his compelling portrayals of highly varied characters. His one-man dramatic musical comedy experience, "Southern Fried Shakespeare" premiered in November 2018 to rave reviews. The show has been on hiatus during the pandemic but is returning on Saturday, November 13, in Atlanta, GA.

Meryl Ann Butler: Thanks for visiting with us at OpEdNews, Robert! I met you at positive music icon, Faith Rivera's, online workshop, and you have a remarkable story! First let's start with your inspiration for "Southern Fried Shakespeare".

Robert James: Thank you so much for inviting me. I'm excited to share my story and my show with your readers.

At some point most every actor in training will be exposed to the classics including the works of William Shakespeare. Like many, I not only struggled with the subtle nuances of his scripts but just trying to make sense of the old fashioned language.

Actors use many tricks to memorize lines such as singing them, repeating very fast or slow, etc. I often try out different accents to see what fits. I stumbled upon a genteel old southern accent for Richard III's opening monologue which just seemed to work for some reason. I shared it with my instructor and after some initial eye rolls he had to admit it was easier to understand. I filed it away until years later I met with a producer who was looking for fresh ideas and I remembered I had coined the piece Southern Fried Shakespeare. He loved the name and wanted to know the show concept and details of which I had none!

Over the next 2 weeks of frantic creative necessity I wrote the first show with 4 Shakespeare characters Romeo, Richard III, Mark Anthony, and Hamlet. Introducing a sarcastic but lovable hostess, Auntie Bella and you have Southern Fried Shakespeare, A Dramatic Musical Comedy Experience.

The new incarnation of the show contains three more characters and all new original songs.

Robert James, Southern Fried Shakespeare
Robert James, Southern Fried Shakespeare
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MAB: It sounds great! Who is your favorite Billy-Boy Shakespeare character to portray?

RJ: Who is my favorite child, eh? I can tell you the two most impactful.

Richard III being the first will always be special to me and it's always challenging to find the perspective of the classic villain and dig into why they do what they do.

However, the biggest breakthrough character for me is Hamlet. Instead of a young boy, my Hamlet is a middle-aged alcoholic woman. Originally, I thought it would be funny to have a drunk drag queen at a bar drowning her sorrows (to be or not to be...) but discovering her became a long journey for me to explore my own prejudices regarding substance abuse and mental health. She truly is a tragic figure struggling to assert her existence amidst an unaccepting and at times cruel world. Her experiences mirror some of my own journey as a gay man growing up in a small rural midwestern town.

MAB: I heard your backstory at Faith's workshop - you weren't always a singer and actor, in fact, you were stage-shy. Can you share how that changed?

RJ: Yes, as I mentioned I grew up in small town in Michigan - always wanting to perform but very conscious of outward appearances. At the time, to me, Theatre equaled gay which was something I tried very hard to conceal.

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Meryl Ann Butler is an artist, author, educator and OpedNews Managing Editor who has been actively engaged in utilizing the arts as stepping-stones toward joy-filled wellbeing since she was a hippie. She began writing for OpEdNews in Feb, 2004. She became a Senior Editor in August 2012 and Managing Editor in January, (more...)
 

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