Bogan Shakespeare

A satirical retelling of the most iconic of Shakespeare’s works, Bogan Shakespeare is accessible to any audience, whether you’ve read all thirty-seven plays, just watched the Baz Luhrmann movie or haven’t seen a show since that horrible two hours you spent watching your 14-year-old nephew in his school play. This show has something for everybody. Fancy a love story? We got you. Love your sport? So do we. Like a cheeky murder from time to time? We will sort you out. Bogan Shakespeare will give you everything short of a never-ending packet of Tim-Tams, and believe me-we tried that one too.

We will ostensibly be pitching all five shows that have been adapted to date (Romeo & Juliet, Macbeth, Hamlet, Much Ado About Nothing and Julius Caesar). Our script excerpt will be from out most recent (Comedy Award winning) adaptation Julius Caesar.

Its blurb is as follows:

At the local Busselton Bunnings you will find a man like no other. A leader, a visionary, a Retail Operations Manager; Jewlz Caesar. Still riding the high from their victory over Masters Home Improvement, things are going well for the Bunnings retail team. Sales are up, foot traffic is strong and sausage sizzles are going gang busters. But beneath the surface, discontent is slowly brewing. Strap in for a story of intrigue, hubris, betrayal and lacklustre coffee; a story that explores the truly unknowable horror that is retail work and asks the question: “Worker. Manager. Customer. Who are the real monsters?”

Form and Style

Each production of Bogan Shakespeare is a 60 minute retelling of a different Shakespearean play performed by a cohort of five performers each taking on multiple roles. By focusing only on what you need to know about each story, we take what would usually be two to three hour plays and condense them down to an action-packed, fast-paced hour filled with absurdity, hilarity and even a little pathos. It’ll make you laugh, it’ll make you think and it’ll make you feel.

Community Engagement

We believe there are opportunities for the following types of engagements.

Shakespeare Workshops

Multiple performers within the show have extensive experience both performing and teaching Shakespeare. The benefits of teaching Shakespeare in an engaging relatable way cannot be overstated.

Improvisation/ Comedy Workshops

Writer and creator Dean Lovatt has an ongoing background in performing and teaching improv.

Improvisation is an excellent means of self-expression, confidence building and therapeutic play. It can appeal to adolescence and adults as a form of theatrical expression. An improv workshop can be a simple day of fun and release but can also lay the foundation for future engagement in performance. Barrier for entry and cost of performances for Improv shows are extremely low, meaning there is great potential for a community to begin and sustain it’s own local performance group.

Reviews

★★★★ “Their scripts are tight and acute, their performances full of life and appealing self-awareness, their cultural literacy is spot on and the whole package is really, really funny” – Seesaw Mag 2022

★★★★★ “The collective behind Bogan Shakespeare continue to hit the mark every year, putting on what in my opinion is one of the best shows that Fringe has to offer” – FringeFeed 2022

★★★★½  “whip-smart, hilarious script, and five performers who are operating at 100% from start to finish” –  X-Press Magazine 2021

★★★★ “a hilarious blend of literature and comedy, accompanied by an impressive selection of flannel shirts” – FringeFeed 2021

★★★★ “Making Shakespeare accessible, relevant and, in this case, funny as f**k” – Theatre Travels 2020

★★★★★ “As I sat down to watch this performance, I asked myself ‘Was there really a need for Bogan Shakespeare?’ The answer is yes.” – FringeFeed 2019

★★★★  “I bet you wished your earlier encounters with the Bard were this entertaining.” – FringeFeed 2019

Available Marketing Collaterals

Hero poster.

Variety of cover photos, posters, and group shots.

Production photography from 2018-2022.

Video trailer from 2022 State Theatre Centre season.

Previous media releases.

Credits

Dean Lovatt (Creator, Writer, Producer, Performer)

Dean Lovatt is a versatile creative, writer, performer, director and the Founder and Producer at BS Productions. Dean currently holds a Bachelors in English and Creative arts as well as a Diploma in Secondary education from Murdoch University. Dean has a strong skew toward comedic performance and development. Most notably his work as the writer and creator of Bogan Shakespeare; a now seven year running, best comedy nominated, sold out season Perth Fringe Festival show.

Dr Sarah Courtis (Performer)

Sarah Courtis is an experienced performer, writer, stage manager and director and is on the committee for several theatre companies (GRADS New Fortune theatre project steering committee; Thought Jar Productions). She is a Doctor of Creative Media having graduated with a PhD on the lyric in musical theatre at Murdoch University in 2019. Both academic and practitioner, Sarah teaches theatre to university students at Murdoch and WAAPA and attends conferences around the world. Her performance specialty is Shakespeare, having performed in over 30 productions of his works, however, in the last few years she has shifted into comedy, working with Bogan Shakespeare productions over three sold out seasons.

Jess Lally (Performer)

Jess Lally is an alumnus of the improvised comedy collective The Big Hoo Haa!, an actor and singer with many companies in Perth, and a former drama teacher (Bachelor of Education- Secondary, ECU) with a great love of Shakespeare, fairy tales and clowning around. She is best known for her roles as Princess Katherine in Blak Yak’s Henry V, for which she received a Best Supporting Actress Finley Award nomination; The Little Mermaid and Rapunzel in Grey Lantern’s Disenchanted!, a Weekly Music and Musical Award Winner at FringeWorld; and four-times extended and sold-out Bogan Shakespeare presents Macbeth, at Fringe World. In addition to treading the boards, she has acted as dramaturge and assistant director in multiple award-winning offerings from Holland Street Productions (Falling to the Top: The Musical Trashtacular, Dr Felicity Rickshaw’s Celebrity Sex Party). Jess also acts in films, sings with bands, and is a teacher and corporate trainer.

Maiken Kruger (Performer)

Maiken Kruger is a poet, writer, editor and performer holding a Bachelor of Arts with a double major of English & Creative Writing and Theatre & Drama. With experience in acting as well as directing, Maiken enjoys a multidisciplinary, academic approach to performance-making, with a particular interest in satirical comedy, believing that the social benefits of satire are under appreciated.

Some highlights of Maiken’s career include: co-directing and performing in Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again, co-directing and performing in Bruised, playing Katharina in the New Fortune Theatre project’s moved reading of Taming of the Shrew and, of course, her FRINGE WORLD debut with Bogan Shakespeare Presents: Macbeth in their four-times extended sold out run in 2021. She also won the Theatre Student of the Year Award at Murdoch University in 2020, and the Nexus Theatre Award for PR in 2018.

Harrison Mitchel (Performer)

Harrison Mitchell is a writer, director, producer and performer who has just graduated from Murdoch University with a Double Major in Screen Production, and Theatre and Drama.

Harrison is currently making the jump to writer/director for his upcoming short film “Paper Route.” His previous acting credits include The 1’s The 0’s and Everything In Between (2018) “Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play (2019), Hail Satan (2019), and the 2021 Fringe run of Bogan Shakespeare Presents: Macbeth. Harrison loves storytelling in all forms, but has a real passion for coming-of-age films, Shakespearean text and comedy performance.