New Inland Classical Theatre presents two ‘Tamed’ stage readings this weekend in company’s stage debut

In college, while running an on-campus, student-run, William Shakespeare-specific theater group, Abby Burlingame remembers thinking “If I could do this forever, I would be so happy.”

Life took her in other directions, and she held other positions, but the idea was always there.

“I have what I think is a strong vision for what programming can look like and how exciting and bold it could be,” she said.

Burlingame has been doing theater since she was “yay high” while growing up in the Seattle area. Since moving to Spokane five years ago, she has worked with just about every theater in town, including Stage Left Theater and Spokane Civic Theater. Burlingame has also directed with the Spokane Shakespeare Society and is also a playwright.

Even with all that experience, Burlingame didn’t want to jump into the process of founding a theater company without the right people beside her. She, Jeffrey St. George, Abby Constable, Carrie Bostick and Jeffrey Ridlington began brainstorming their ideal theater company, all agreeing they wanted to focus on producing classic works, including but not limited to Shakespeare.

With that, Inland Classical Theatre began to take shape.

Burlingame is the artistic director, and St. George, who has performed such roles as Hamlet and Macbeth and has produced shows with Oregon Adventure Theater and Spokane Shakespeare Society, is the executive director.

Constable, Bostick and Ridlington make up the theater’s board.

After members of the troupe performed a 30-minute radio play of Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” for KYRS earlier this month, Inland Classical Theatre makes its stage debut with music stand readings of Shakespeare’s “The Taming of the Shrew” and John Fletcher’s “The Tamer Tamed.”

In “The Taming of the Shrew,” Petruchio is looking for love in Padua. Bianca wishes to get married but can’t until her older sister Kate does. Petruchio decides Kate shall be his bride and vows to tame her, even as Kate puts up a fight.

In “The Tamer Tamed,” which was written as a direct response to “The Taming of the Shrew,” Kate has passed away, and Petruchio is now with Maria, who seems to be quite demure and obedient. After the two are married, Maria reveals her true self and vows to tame her husband. This decision inspires women throughout town to do the same.

The two shows feature the same cast: Sydney Anderson (Merchant/Julia), Justin Bees (Petruchio), Carrie Bostick (Hortensio/Sophocles), Eupheme Carruthers (Biondello/Pedro), Bri Castillo (Grumio/Country Wife), Abby Constable (Katherine/Maria), Susan Hardie (Baptista/Petronius), Pam Kingsley (Gremio/Moroso), Jared McDougall (Tranio), Matt Pope (Bianca/Livia), Maile Quisano (Vicentio/Jaques) and Joseph Selle (Lucentio/Roland).

St. George will direct “The Taming of the Shrew,” and Burlingame will direct “The Tamer Tamed.” This series of shows is a fundraiser to help with future Inland Classical Theatre productions.

The cast will perform “The Taming of the Shrew” Thursday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. They’ll present “The Tamer Tamed” on Friday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m.

These productions are hosted by Spokane Children’s Theatre.

The theater team wanted to offer a summer production but weren’t ready for a full show, so they decided a music stand reading production would be a good introduction for audiences to Inland Classical Theatre.

Burlingame suggested putting “The Taming of the Shrew” in conversation with “The Tamer Tamed,” which she sees as the antidote to the famously misogynistic play, and the rest of the team quickly got on board with the idea.

When people think about “The Taming of the Shrew,” St. George said people are really thinking about a play within a play. The opening scene features a drunkard being made to think he’s a Lord and that a group of actors are going to put on a play for him.

“From a staging perspective, that was perhaps a little easier to accept in Shakespeare’s time, and it’s used as a framing device to separate the audience from the content of the play, which is a little bit disturbing,” St. George said. “That almost always gets kept and so the audience doesn’t necessarily get to have that perspective, and it’s totally removed in my rendition play as well, because we don’t necessarily want to disconnect the audience from the content of the play, which, depending on what direction you go, can be a little bit horrified.”

St. George said removing the “softening element” of the opening scene can present a moral quandary – “Do I want to participate in this message?” – but he said the two-show format allows it because the second show serves as a balm for the first.

The only character from “The Taming of the Shrew” who also appears in “The Tamer Tamed” is Petruchio, though Fletcher has taken character types from Shakespeare’s play and brought them into his own. The same actor will portray the Shakespeare character and the character type, Constable as Katherine and Maria, for example, which Burlingame said will help with continuity for audiences coming two nights in a row.

Another challenge of the show comes from Fletcher’s voice being so much different than Shakespeare’s. Fletcher loves to write long rants for his characters, Burlingame said. He’s also more direct.

“Shakespeare is sometimes known for being a little raunchy, for having some dirty jokes in there,” she said. “Fletcher’s dirty jokes are on the surface. It’s still appropriate because it’s still in that older language, but if you’re getting those jokes, you’re like ‘Oh, wow, this is like an episode of “King of the Hill” ’ or something a little bit raunchy.”

Though these are music stand productions, where the actors will be reading from scripts on music stands, both Burlingame and St. George said audiences can still expect dynamic performances.

The Inland Classical team is working on building its first full season, which will feature fully staged shows as well as more radio productions with KYRS. They hope to eventually offer training and educational opportunities.

All to get more classical works to Inland Northwest audiences.

“We’re bringing classical works to the community because we feel like they’re stories that are still relevant to the modern audience, whether that’s through a reimagining or through commentary on how things used to be compared to the present day,” St. George said. “We think that there is still value in these stories, and we hope to prove that to you and in the interim, if you think that we have value to the community, I would implore you, please consider supporting us by coming to see our work. You won’t leave disappointed.”