Minnesota Fringe Festival 2025: "Breakneck Twelfth Night"

Day: 9

Show: 30

Title: Breakneck Twelfth Night

Category: Drama / Musical Theater / Original Music / Physical Theater / Solo Show / Shakespearian elements

By: Timothy Mooney Repertory Theatre

Created by: Timothy Mooney

Location: Barker Center

Summary: Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, or What You Will, performed in one hour by one actor.

Highlights: Timothy Mooney is such a pro at this, and always impressive. The show truly is this familiar comedic play about a brother and sister separated by a shipwreck and mistaken for each other when the sister disguises herself as a man and woos the lady Olivia on behalf of the Duke, but at breakneck pace. And I don't think he really cuts out any plotlines, he just condenses everything. He walks us though the play scene by scene, summarizing some of the lines as exposition, but also speaking many of the lines as all of the different characters. He also provides some commentary, like the fact that Shakespeare always included male actors in drag, in particular this play with its double-drag, because women weren't allowed on the stage. And he fully performs each character, all distinct with different mannerisms and body carriage and style of speech, even singing the songs written into the script (this is the play that gave us the famous line, "if music be the food of love, play on"). He presents these 400+ year old classics so convincingly, so engagingly, so entertainingly, in this short time, that one wonders why Shakespeare ever needs to be more than an hour.

Read all of my Fringe mini-reviews here. 

Minnesota Fringe Festival 2023: "Breakneck Midsummer Night’s Dream"

Day: 9

Show: 31

Title: Breakneck Midsummer Night’s Dream

Category: CLOWNING / COMEDY / PHYSICAL THEATER / STORYTELLING / HISTORICAL CONTENT / LITERARY ADAPTATION / SHAKESPEARIAN ELEMENTS

By: Timothy Mooney Repertory Theatre

Created by: Timothy Mooney

Location: Rarig Thrust

Summary: Just what it sounds like - 6 actors perform Shakespeare's most popular comedy in an hour or less.

Highlights: I've seen traveling Fringe artist Timothy Mooney a couple of times before, and typically he performs an entire Shakespeare play in an hour playing all of the characters himself. This time he's brought in 5 additional actors (Schmoo Cutlip, Cindy Sherden, and local artists Alison Anderson, Peter Buckholtz, and J Merrill Motz) to help with the feat of portraying some 20 characters in this normally 2-3 hour story. As usual, Timothy's adaptation gets right to the heart of the story, includes all of the well-known lines (e.g., "Lord ,what fools these mortals be"), and leaves me wondering what was cut out because the story seems so complete and thoroughly, if quickly, told (and makes me think Shakespeare should always be an hour long). The playful and energetic cast is all dressed in black (except for Cindy as Puck who missed the memo, and instead wears a cute Tinkerbell costume as the impish Puck), and dons a vest or crown or epaulettes to signify a character change. At times they're changing characters within a scene, quickly stepping behind one of the half dozen or so trees that make up the forest. Part of the fun is watching them scurry from one character to the next. If you need a traditional but quick Shakespeare fix at the Fringe, there's no better place to get it than Timothy Mooney Repertory Theatre.

Read all of my Fringe mini-reviews here.

Minnesota Fringe Festival 2021: "Breakneck Comedy of Errors"

Day: 6

Show: 14

Performance Type: Virtual

Location: Streaming Anytime

Length: 60 minutes

Title: Breakneck Comedy of Errors

By: Timothy Mooney Repertory Theatre

Summary: A one-man one-hour retelling of Shakespeare's wacky tale of twins - The Comedy of Errors.

Highlights: Timothy Mooney, who also brought us Breakneck Hamlet at the 2015 Fringe, among others, now brings that breakneck speed through a full Shakespeare play to the virtual world. It's no less impressive, perhaps even more so, because now he only has the change of hat or wig, along with voice and facial expressions, to create all these different characters, rather than a full performance space. Scene by scene, he leads us through the ridiculous story of two sets of twins separated at birth who by happenstance are reunited with each other and their parents (soap operas got nothin' on Shakespeare). He also manages to provide historical background to the story, and most amusingly, commentary on the story, characters, and dialogue. In a weird way, it's actually a great and accessible way to be introduced to or gain more understanding of a Shakespeare play. An this one in particular, with all it's mistaken identities and plot twists, is particularly fun. One look at the detailed show image should tell you that.

Read all of my Fringe mini-reviews here.

Fringe Festival 2015: "Breakneck Hamlet"

Day: 7

Show: 32

Title: Breakneck Hamlet

Category: Something Different

By: Timothy Mooney Repertory Theatre

Created by: Timothy Mooney

Location: Minneapolis Theatre Garage

Summary: A one-man show of Shakespeare's most famous play that includes every scene and comes in at under an hour.

Highlights: Timothy Mooney delivers an engaging, amusing, and respectful version of Hamlet that doesn't miss a thing, despite being less than an hour long. I've seen Hamlet many times (more than any other Shakespeare play), and yet I feel like I've gained new insights through this production. Timothy is a charming host as he leads us through every scene in the five-act play, sometimes describing the action, sometimes offering historical context, and sometimes reciting lines or monologues from the play. It's super fast but feels like a complete story, and Timothy delivers his adaptation with much energy, excitement, physicality, and a great use of the space at the Theatre Garage. You've probably seen Hamlet before, but you've never seen Hamlet quite like this.