Kentucky Shakespeare presents World Premiere
UNTIMELY RIPP’D
AN IMMERSIVE MACABRE MACBETH EXPERIENCE
Continuing their Halloween production tradition, Kentucky Shakespeare presents a new experience from the creative team of their 2022 hit sold-out production of Enter Ghost. At Kentucky Shakespeare’s Old Louisville Headquarters, utilizing silent disco headphone technology, audience members will move throughout an immersive world premiere production inspired by Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Kentucky Shakespeare commissioned playwrights Diana Grisanti and Steve Moulds to create this hour-long sensory event, conceived by the pair with director Matt Wallace.
The production runs October 2-27 at 616 Myrtle Street inside Kentucky Shakespeare’s headquarters in Old Louisville.
During the experience, audience members will wear provided headphones and travel to various indoor locations (with places to sit periodically). Running time is approximately one hour with no intermission.
The production is directed by Kentucky Shakespeare Producing Artistic Director Matt Wallace and features an eight-member ensemble cast: Katie Blackerby, Zachary Burrell, Sasha Cifuentes, Jon Huffman, Braden McCampbell, Mollie Murk, Jennifer Reyes, and Crystian Wiltshire. The award-winning* design team: Jesse AlFord is Lighting Designer, Karl Anderson is Scenic Designer, Laura Ellis is the Sound Designer, Donna Lawrence-Downs is Costume Designer, and Sam Powers is Properties Designer, with fight choreography by Eric Frantz, dialect coaching by Joy Lanceta Coronel, and video by Abby Sage. Rachel Meadors is the stage manager and Caroline Cox is the Assistant Stage Manager. (*Designers Jesse AlFord, Karl Anderson, Laura Ellis, and Donna Lawrence-Downs won Arts-Louisville Theatre Awards for their design work on the 2022 Kentucky Shakespeare production of Enter Ghost. an immersive haunted Hamlet experience.)
Event Details:
UNTIMELY RIPP’D
AN IMMERSIVE MACABRE MACBETH EXPERIENCE
October 2-27, 2024
Preview performance Wednesday, October 2; Press opening October 3; Running Wednesdays through Sundays
7:00PM and 9:00PM evening performances; 2:00PM and 4:00PM Sunday matinees (Sunday evening performances only on October 6 due to St. James Court Arts Show; Added 4:00PM Saturday matinee on October 19.)
Tickets: $28
Kentucky Shakespeare Headquarters, 616 Myrtle Street, Louisville, KY 40208
Visit kyshakespeare.com for tickets and information.
Run-Time: 60 minutes with no intermission
During the ticket checkout process, audience members will have option to make a donation to Kentucky Shakespeare. Donors $20 and above will receive a commemorative Untimely Ripp’d t-shirt at the performance, with one t-shirt per each $20 donation.
About the Playwrights:
Diana Grisanti is an award-winning playwright and educator whose work has been produced across the country. Her plays include Vanessa in Bed (Audible Theatre, starring Karla Souza and Zoë Winters); Bowling for Beginners; Lawbreakers! (a fast and furious history of women’s suffrage); The Patron Saint of Losing Sleep; River City; and several bilingual musicals for young audiences, commissioned and produced by Creede Repertory Theatre. Diana has been a Michener Fellow, a Kentucky Arts Council Fellow, and a Writer in Residence at Vanderbilt University. Untimely Ripp’d marks another entry in Diana’s ongoing artistic partnership with Steve Moulds. Other Grismoulds collaborations include Enter Ghost. (Kentucky Shakespeare); The Two Lobbyists of Verona (Theatre [502] and Kentucky Shakespeare); The Stranger and Ludlow Quinn (Theatre [502]); The Baker Goes to War (Commonwealth Theatre Center); and Victor Grisanti Moulds (age 8). She teaches dramatic writing at Ball State University.
Steve Moulds returns to Kentucky Shakespeare after 2022’s Enter Ghost. He has been a Michener Center fellow, a Jerome Fellow at The Playwrights’ Center, an NNPN Playwright in Residence, a Kentucky Arts Council Fellow, and a Writer in Residence at Vanderbilt University. Plays include The Body; Sergio’s Museum; Emergency Prom; the Humana Festival anthology Oh, Gastronomy!; and The Wedding Guest (Actors Theatre of Louisville). In recent years, Steve has written three commissions for young audiences: Maximum Conflict: Eternal Strife and the musical Ask a Kid for Creede Repertory (Colorado), and the forthcoming Galaxy Girl for The Appalachian Center for the Arts (Pikeville, KY). His published adaptations of Six Characters in Search of an Author and Kafka’s Metamorphosis have been performed around the world. Untimely Ripp’d is the fifth play Steve has written with his spouse, Diana Grisanti. Steve is also a former Jeopardy! champion, and will happily talk about it with anyone who wants details.
Audience Reviews from Kentucky Shakespeare’s 2022 sold-out production of Enter Ghost. an immersive haunted Hamlet experience:
“…a modern-day Old Louisville ghost story… The design work is particularly important here, and everyone is at the top of their game… As for the performances, they are uniformly excellent… Enter Ghost is moody and engrossing, not jump out of your seat scary… It forces you to see the overly familiar with fresh eyes. For a company devoted to the works of William Shakespeare, this is a most crucial part of their mission… lingering dread to leave the theatre with you, bereft of the cozy conventions of theatre etiquette.” – Keith Waits, Arts-Louisville review
“If you don’t have a ticket to Ghost from @kyshakespeare, you missed out! Experimental, fun, modern. I kept thinking, this is something I would see in New York. So happy that Louisville has this. As always with KY Shakes, amazing actors”
—@abbydlong
“Went to see ENTER GHOST at @kyshakespeare this evening and it was SO TERRIFIC. Really enjoyable, innovative, immersive, spooky. I love that our local Shakespeare company does such cool stuff. Go see it if you can.”
—@taraEanderson
“@kyshakespeare keeps taking incredible risks this season, and they pay off every time! ENTER GHOST was one of those shows that left me wanting to create theatre. I’m so thankful I had the chance to experience this exciting, bizarre, and unnerving piece of experimental theatre!” – Neill
“We enjoyed Enter Ghost so much that in the car on the way home we reserved tickets to see it again!” – @cronalicious.lwg
“Brilliant, fun and spooky! We are so fortunate to have our KY Shakespeare.” – Adam
Untimely Ripp’d is made possible through support from Ball State University’s Aspire program, Fund for the Arts, Givaudan, the Kentucky Arts Council, and Don Stevens & Libby Marbury. Production Partners are Louisville Silent Disco and ZFX Flying Effects.
If you would like to schedule an interview with Matt Wallace, Producing Artistic Director, or learn more about Kentucky Shakespeare, please contact 502.574.9900 ext. 12 or at info@kyshakespeare.com.