It’s 1595, and brothers Nick and Nigel Bottom are desperate to write a hit play, but find themselves stuck in the shadow of that Renaissance rock star known as “The Bard.” When a local soothsayer foretells that the future of theater involves singing, dancing, and acting—all at the same time—Nick and Nigel set out to write the world’s very first musical. Amidst the scandalous excitement of opening night, the Bottom brothers realize that reaching the top means being true to thine own self—and all that jazz.
Book by Karey Kirkpatrick and John O'Farrell. Music and lyrics by Wayne Kirkpatrick and Karey Kirkpatrick. Conceived by Karey Kirkpatrick and Wayne Kirkpatrick.
Directed by Paul Daigneault. Music direction by Dan Rodriguez. Choreography by Taavon Gamble.
This performance has been selected as part of Boston Conservatory at Berklee’s spring 2024 Center Stage collection.
Something Rotten is presented through special arrangement with Music Theatre International (MTI). All authorized performance materials are also supplied by MTI.
Read more about Boston Conservatory's production of
Something Rotten. Program Information
Dramaturgy Note
So much of the entertainment we consume is steeped in parody, satire, and self-referentiality. Social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok feature repurposed and recontextualized content as a source for short-form comedy, assuming that audiences can appreciate parody without needing much knowledge of the original “text.” Even if you’ve never read “The Scottish Play,” you can enjoy a night at Drunk Shakespeare. You appreciate the use of the phrase “To be, or not to be” as a gesture toward literary or artistic elitism without having to know anything about the meaning of Hamlet’s speech in Act III, Scene 1.
Our interest in satirical and caricaturing entertainment has carried over into musical theater and seems to have kicked into high gear in the last few decades. In 1982, Forbidden Broadway, a musical revue spoofing commercial musical theater, deserves credit for perfecting the musical parody genre. Spamalot, Urinetown, The Drowsy Chaperone, and The Producers have all capitalized on and imitated this premise, proving that musical theater audiences crave send-ups of their favorite familiar shows. Something Rotten offers us what we know and love in parodic musical theater: inside jokes and intertextual references that both mock and celebrate source texts, alongside an anachronistic reimagining of William Shakespeare as the Taylor Swift of the Elizabethan era.
Of course, parody in theater is nothing new. Theater historians generally credit Aristophanes’s The Frogs (405 BCE) as one of the first surviving examples of theater poking fun at theater, as it includes a scene between the playwrights Aeschylus and Euripedes, fighting over who was the better dramatic poet. That said, it is unsurprising that in 2024, when we are overwhelmed and overstimulated by a plethora of media content, parody allows us to appreciate artistic works collectively. In a postmodern world, we’re often more familiar with the parody than the source text itself; but is that so bad? Is that not an implicit honoring of the original text, even if our interpretation has become exaggerated and … in some cases, scrambled? Either way, for this performance, as a poet once said, “Prepare for mirth / for mirth becomes a feast.” But I might be misquoting.
—Dr. Helen Lewis-Michelson
Cast
SHAKESPEARE – Errol Service Jr.
NICK BOTTOM – Brendan Sheehan
NIGEL BOTTOM – Dashawn McClinton
BEA – Meghan Carey
PORTIA – Sophie Lindwall
NOSTRADAMUS – Aaron Graham
BROTHER JEREMIAH – Brevan Collins
LORD CLAPHAM – Eli Schulman
MINSTREL – Kenny Lee
TROUPE/MECHANICALS
Jack Romero
Wyatt Anton
Eli Schulman
Elaine Whitbeck
David Royzenblat
Max Guttman
Lillian Salazar
BARD BOYS
Preston Karp
Jaiden Jones
Kenny Lee
Jake Siffert
ENSEMBLE
Lexie Brown
Steven Eckloff
Olivia Giorgio-Freiberger
Bailey Greeman
Max Guttman
Kindred Moore
Payton Hines
Jaiden Jones
Shin Kim
Preston Karp
Miriam Marwood
Reagan McComas
David Royzenblat
Jake Siffert
Nina-Simone Diaz
Lillian Salazar
Elaine Whitbeck
TAP ENSEMBLE
Lexie Brown
Steven Eckloff
Olivia Giorgio–Freiberger
Bailey Greeman
Max Guttman
Shinn Kim
Jake Siffert
Nina–Simone Diaz
SWINGS
Emma Kops
Jackson Smith
DANCE CAPTAINS
Olivia Giorgio-Freiberger
Steven Eckloff
UNDERSTUDY CAST
SHAKESPEARE – Wyatt Anton
NICK BOTTOM – Jaiden Jones
NIGEL BOTTOM – Preston Karp
BEA – Miriam Marwood
PORTIA – Payton Hines
NOSTRADAMUS – Elaine Whitbeck
BROTHER JEREMIAH – Jake Siffert
LORD CLAPHAM – Steven Eckloff
MINSTREL – Shin Kim
Orchestra
CONDUCTOR
Dan Rodriguez
KEYBOARD 1
Dan Rodriguez
KEYBOARD 2
Kanisha Kellum
KEYBOARD 3
Ben Laham
VIOLIN
Brianna Ingber
REEDS
Daniel Meza
TRUMPET
Jay Daly
TROMBONE
Lauren Galarraga
GUITAR 1
Tyler Doucette
GUITAR 2
Angus Munroe
BASS
Sahil Warsi
DRUMS
Yun-Chen Chou
Production Credits
CREATIVE TEAM:
Director – Paul Daigneault
Conductor/Music Director – Dan Rodriguez
Choreographer - Taavon Gamble
Associate Music Director – Kanisha Kellum
Scenic Designer – Janie Howland
Assistant Scenic Designer - Narissa Kelliher
Props Designer – Jake Lutter
Lighting Designer – Karen Perlow
Costume Designer – Rachel Padula-Shufelt
Sound Designer – Daniel Gonko
Production Stage Manager – Katie Arnold
Assistant Stage Manager – Zachary Sayre
Intimacy/Fight Coordinator – Jesse Hinson
Dialect Coach – Lee Nishri-Howitt
Dramaturg – Helen Lewis-Michelson
Student Assistant Director – Brogan Nelson
Student Assistant Stage Managers – Alex Taylor, Claire Flynn
Assistant Student Dramaturg – Sophie Davis
Intimacy Captain – Kindred Moore
PRODUCTION STAFF:
Director of Performance Services – Hanna Oravec
Assistant Director of Production – Rebecca Donald
Stage Manager – Katie Arnold
Technical Director – Taylor Kaufman
Assistant Technical Director – Caleb D. Harris
Stage Supervisor –
Props Manager – Emma Whiteside
Costume Shop Manager – Alison Pugh
Assistant Costume Shop Manager – Leah Foley
Stock Manager/Draper/Stitcher - Rebecca Jewett
Wardrobe Manager – Blue Barber
Wardrobe Assistant – Liv Curnen
Stitchers/Drapers – Sam Martin, Caroline Seeley
Stitcher – Lindsey Weaver
Costume Shop Intern – Olivia Donnelly
Lighting Supervisor – Baz Kouba
Production Electrician – Gabe Goldman
Audio Supervisor/A1 – Steve Deptula
A2 – Kait Kelly
Audio Engineer – Maddy Poston
STUDENT PRODUCTION STAFF:
Student Crew – Tatiana Arias, Emma McClain, Brooke Leila, Antonio Rosas, Sofie Daniel, Cortlandt Barrett, Brandon Howard, Evan Owen, Catie Jamieson, Dora Schulman, Elaina Trousdale, Brielle Diaz-Withers
Production Assistants – Olivia Monarch, Aidan Rufer, Bri Chang, Preston Milne
Costume Assistants – Samantha Fleeter, Amber Lew, Valeria Mateus, Mai Beisley, Sol Mundle
Light Board Programmers – Olivia Monarch
CONCERT SERVICES STAFF:
Senior Manager of Concert Services – Luis Herrera
Coordinator, Concert Services – Matthew Carey
Concert Production Manager – Kendall Floyd
Performance Technology Technicians – Sara Pagiaro, Goran Daskalov
Special Thanks
Maggie Wisniewski and Bella Donneruno and their hilarious ideas.
Boston Conservatory thanks audience members for viewing this program information online. This paperless program saved 5,250 sheets of paper, 556 gallons of water, and 467 pounds of CO2–equivalent greenhouse gas emissions.
