SAXTONS RIVER — Main Street Arts (MSA), 35 Main Street, will present a series of four workshops in which actors have the opportunity to “play” with the works of the Bard. John Hadden, director of MSA’s Hamlet last summer, will hold the workshops on Sunday afternoons in February and March.
The three-hour sessions are open to actors of all levels. Participants will begin with short monologues and move on to excerpts of scenes. The workshops will include work on speeches, simple group exercises, and conversations. Class members are not obligated to work “in the spotlight”; rather, the level of participation is up to the individual.
Sessions are 1 to 4 p.m. at MSA on Feb. 19 and 26, and March 5 and 12.
At the end of the final session, a Shakespeare Tea will be offered to the public, when willing participants can try out their work in front of a small audience of friends in a relaxed setting. A general conversation about Shakespeare in our time and place will be led by Hadden.
In addition to being a director and actor, Hadden is a writer, builder, and teacher, living on a small farm in Landgrove. He is a founding member of Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Massachusetts, and ran the Theater Company at Hubbard Hall in Cambridge, New York.
Hadden has played numerous classic roles in regional theaters, including Romeo, Hamlet, Iago, Richard II, and Leontes, as well as roles on film, radio and TV, and directed approximately 50 productions in the U.S. and abroad.
More information about the workshops may be found at mainstreetarts.org/shakespeare, or contact Hadden directly at johnhadden@gmail.com.