Something wicked this way comes! The Rustic Mechanicals will proudly present Shakespeare’s classic tragedy Macbeth to Fairmont State University as part of their 2025 Vaulting Ambition Tour! Fairmont State has become a staple visit in every Rustic Mechanicals tour, and they are delighted to be back on campus. Founded in the summer of 2014, The Rustic Mechanicals is the only troupe of actors in the state dedicated to touring the works of William Shakespeare and other classical playwrights.
Murder, prophecy, witches and surprisingly, love! The power of a prophecy tempts the ambitious General Macbeth and his passionately persuasive wife to accelerate their road to royalty. Something wicked this way comes when the real-life husband and wife founders of the Rustic Mechanicals play the original power couple whose vaulting ambition unravels their love and their lives.
Jim Warren, director of Macbeth, is ecstatic to bring the magic of a tragedy to life in a new, unique way. “What an awesome challenge we have in carrying the torch–so to speak, of doing Macbeth using Shakespeare’s Staging Conditions to gross-out, freak-out, surprise, delight and scare our audiences without light boards, sound boards or electric fog machines. We will create a live, acoustic soundtrack: creepy sounds/voices that will help an audience imagine the heath, the castles, the backdrop for the battles in ways that Shakespeare’s company did for the play’s first audiences. And underneath it all has to be love! If our production is not filled with big love, the story, the tragedy doesn’t work. I am completely bored by and intolerant of theatre, tv, film where I don’t care about characters.”
Directed by Jim Warren alongside Voice & Text Coach Bridget Rue Esterhuizen, Fight Choreographer Millie Omps and Dramaturg John S. Shirley, with Production Design by Jason A Young and Production and Tour Management by Niki DeWitt, the Mechanicals featured in this production include Jason A Young, Sarah Young, Joshua Brooks, Stephen Phillips, Sinead Tobin, Asa Krinov, Aaron Harris, Seret Cole and Iris Kolenich.
James Matthews, professor of English at Fairmont State, is thrilled for the Mechanical’s return. “Shakespeare’s characters, their challenges and motivations, are as timely now as they were in his own day. And the RM have over ten years of experience bringing those characters to life for West Virginia audiences.”
The Mechanicals will be touring Macbeth throughout the spring and fall months for schools and educational purposes, and the historical epic Henry V in the summer of 2025. The Mechanicals focus on making Shakespeare’s plays accessible to modern audiences by utilizing dynamic and extreme casting techniques paired with Shakespeare’s staging condition.
This performance of Macbeth will be held in Wallman Hall on the campus of Fairmont State University on Monday, April 7. The doors open at 6:30 p.m. for a music pre-show, and the performance begins at 7:00 p.m. Admission is free! Both Fairmont State and the Rustic Mechanicals encourage the public to show their support for this event at The Rustic Mechanicals Facebook page.
Questions about the production and how to book a show can be directed to The Vintage Theatre Company, LLC at (304) 566-9011 or vtcrusticmechanicals@gmail.com.
