CLARKSBURG – “Is this a kazoo which I see before me …”
Well, maybe.
And most likely, if it’s a production by The Rustic Mechanicals, West Virginia’s only professional Shakespeare troupe.
The company that blends serious acting chops with often irreverent takes on the works of the Bard is seeking student actors for its 2026 Summer Shakespeare Intensive next month in Clarksburg, its home base.
Actors are being asked to audition for “The Winter’s Tale,” which blends tragedy and comedy in a sweeping character study of romance with more twists than a West Virginia two-lane.
Be prepared to do a Shakespearean monologue that’s around 60 seconds long, the company said.
If you’re also a musician, bring your instrument so you can play part of a song. Actor-singers who don’t play instruments will perform acapella for their part of the tryout.
Auditions for the company’s annual Shakespeare Intensive will be at 4 p.m. daily April 15-18 at the Uptown Event Center in Clarksburg.
Email vtcrusticmechanicals@gmail.com for your preferred day. Callbacks, if needed, will be April 19.
Memorizing your lines isn’t necessarily required for your initial audition, the troupe said, but it is encouraged.
Actors who make the cut will do a first read-through April 23, the date recognized as William Shakespeare’s birthday.
“The Winter’s Tale” runs July 30-Aug. 2.
The Rustic Mechanicals, as said, aren’t afraid to play to the crowd for laughs.
Songs you sing to on your drive home from work are also interwoven in the productions on sets with contemporary furniture and actors wearing everything from Metallica T-shirts and well-sprung Levis – to job interview suits and shined shoes.
Neon headbands, tie-dye, bubble machines and kazoos figured into one memorable production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
If it’s slapstick, the Mechanicals’ producing artistic director Jason A. Young said, it’s serious slapstick.
The actors chosen in April, he stresses, will become apprentices to the working pros in the troupe that was founded in the summer of 2014 and has been touring the state and region since.
“We aren’t just ‘putting on a play,’” Young said.
“We are training the next generation of West Virginia artists to handle Shakespeare’s work with professional-grade skill and infectious energy.”
