Drunk Shakespeare
Drunk Shakespeare
Open run 1h 30m NYC: Midtown W
86% 1K+ reviews
86%
(1149 Ratings)
Positive
92%
Mixed
5%
Negative
3%
Members say
Entertaining, Clever, Funny, Hilarious, Delightful

About the Show

An actor drinks heavily (think Comedy Central's 'Drunk History') and tries to corral others into enacting a story by the Bard.

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Critic Reviews (8)

The New York Times
January 25th, 2016

"It seems inevitable that soon all performing will be done either plastered or stoned. Among the early adopters of this trend, probably no one is applying more verve to the conceit than the members of the Drunk Shakespeare Society. Here’s hoping others learn from their sloshy example...It offers considerably more fun than many Shakespeare productions, worth experiencing not to watch an actor get drunk, but to watch a cast juggle so many balls so adroitly."
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The Wall Street Journal
August 26th, 2014

"Drunk Shakespeare weaves improv comedy into Shakespeare's text. One actor in the play is given five shots of alcohol, often whiskey. Then, the thespian can interrupt the show by yelling "Drunk Point of Order!" and make up a rule that the other actors have to abide by. During a recent "Macbeth," Macduff demanded that fellow actors instead call him "MacDaddy." "
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AM New York
May 21st, 2014

"It’s a pleasant mix of immersive theater, iambic pentameter, audience participation, slapstick comedy and bar hopping. The comic bits, while nowhere near as clever as what you’d find in “The Complete Works of Shakespeare (abridged),” are at least cute. Some lines from the movie “Independence Day” may have also been inserted into the text."
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Talkin' Broadway
May 15th, 2014

"This self-described “drinking club with a Shakespeare problem” has, well, a Shakespeare problem. The good news is that it doesn’t have a comedy problem: this quintet had no trouble keeping the laughs frequent, buoyant, and loud for 90 solid minutes, and on some level, that’s all that matters. Still, they’re shallow laughs about things unrelated to what Shakespeare wrote."
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CurtainUp
May 15th, 2015

"It's a hit-and-miss production...Although there are stretches when more suds than Shakespearean substance flows, all in all, Drunk Shakespeare deserves a toast. It takes the Bard out of his Ivory Tower of elitism and makes him accessible to those who like their Bard with a beer."
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Theater In The Now
November 12th, 2014

"'Drunk Shakespeare' is an all inclusive night of fun and games. Be prepared to be pulled right into the action. And be prepared to shell out even more cash for overpriced drinks because one shot won’t do it. But hey, the drunker you are the more fun you're bound to have! Just ask my evening's drunk actor."
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C
May 23rd, 2014

"A raucous, high-spirited and indeed drunken mashup of Shakespeare and improv, bedizened with singalongs and shoutalongs, crude ethnic jokes, dancing, rounds of shots, and assorted (and sordid) hilarity and chaos."
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M
May 6th, 2014

"This performance was entertaining, but less cohesive than past intoxicated Shakespeare performances we attended...In the balance between Shakespeare and booze, the latter triumphs here."
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