STAGE WEST: "Twelfth Night of the Living Dead (Or What You Kill)" presented by Loud Fridge Theatre Group

Kaylin Sauer (right) in rehearsal as a zombie Viola in "Twelfth Night of the Living Dead (Or What You Kill)."                                                                                                                           Photo by Clay Greenhalgh

            The conceit of A.J. Schaar’s zombie/Shakespeare mashup “Twelfth Night of the Living Dead (Or What You Kill)” is that The Bard’s well-known characters go about their posturing and prankstering generally without acknowledging that the zombies in their company are any significantly different than they are. This makes for lots of deadpan comedy among the living dead.
            With the exception of a few moments when a human denizen of Illyria flees from a grunting, groaning, writhing zombie character reaching out to them there is no blatant recognition of flesh eaters until the last 20 minutes or so of this world premiere. No detailed giving away of the ending here, but suffice to say the undead have their day and then some.
            “Twelfth Night of the Living Dead” is the first production of fledgling Loud Fridge Theatre Group’s second season and to this point the company’s most ambitious. Staged at the City Heights Performance Annex, it includes a cast of 12, live music, fight choreography and, as you would expect with this show, imaginative makeup and costuming. Loud Fridge’s director of operations Kate Rose Reynolds directs the large and entertaining ensemble which stars Kaylin Saur as a Viola quite unlike the one Reynolds herself portrayed in a production of “Twelfth Night” (sans zombies) in the Bay Area in 2018.
            In playwright Schaar’s world, Viola survives Shakespeare’s shipwreck but washes up a growling, convulsing zombie starved for victims. The foundation of the fanciful “Twelfth Night” story and its beautiful language is maintained – except of course in the latter case Viola does not speak that beautiful language – nor do any of the other characters once they’ve been attacked and “turned” undead.
            In a sense, the zombies-in-“Twelfth Night” gambit is of the one-joke variety, and once you accept it and get used to these characters infiltrating Illyria the shock value is diminished. It’s not a simple device to sustain over the length of this two-hour production, presented without intermission.
            Part of the quandary is that the zombies are up against a well-loved Shakespeare comedy already familiar to many. It’s my favorite of the lot for sure. The presence alone of Sir Toby Belch, Sir Andrew Aguecheek, Feste the fool and Malvolio the vain and foppish steward of Lady Olivia (here Robert Del Pino in drag) constitutes Shakespeare at his most broadly hilarious, their machinations and maneuvers, schemes and sight gags golden.
            It’s like you almost don’t need zombies.
            Even so, Loud Fridge has superbly cast these critical roles. Danny Campbell is delightfully debauched as Sir Toby, his flask of booze ever at the ready. Julia Giolzetti plays off him well as Sir Toby’s partner in crime Sir Andrew. The talented William BJ Robinson is the charming and conniving Feste. As the hapless Malvolio, Lee Engelman is true to the yellow-stockinged, cross-gartered butt of the others’ big joke.
            I never tire of “Twelfth Night’s” “rascals vs. Malvolio” subplot – frankly, it’s better than the original play’s Viola-centered intrigue of bumpy romance and mistaken identity – and this zombied treatment is no exception.
            But let’s give credit where it’s most certainly due: Schaar has worked the zombies into “Twelfth Night’s” narrative without reducing their appearance onstage to comic cameos. They interact with the other characters mostly as written by The Bard albeit without speaking intelligible words. As alluded to earlier, this adherence is maintained for most of “Twelfth Night of the Living Dead,” but when it isn’t – well, you’ll see.
            Then there’s Kaylin Saur. An experienced circus artist, drag performer and actor, she is the bleating beating heart of this production. With her rubberband physicality, stalking non-language and mixture of disorientation and menace, Saur’s zombie Viola is so mesmerizing to watch it’s hard to pay attention to any other character onstage with her. What would seem an exhausting challenge for any actor comes effortlessly for Saur, who I have to say is the most interesting and diverting Viola I’ve yet seen in my many “Twelfth Night” experiences.
            The limitations of the live stage take some of the bite out of the zombie attacks, but Reynolds and her crew creatively use a scrim to reflect much of the mayhem in silhouette. Other such moments of horror are heard offstage, and in the otherwise merely functional City Heights Performance Annex they echo eerily.
            Full disclosure: Unlike both playwright Schaar and director Reynolds, I’m not particularly a fan of zombie movies or TV shows and as such am less apt to revel in this deconstruction. What I do appreciate, however, are inventions that regardless of their nature bring Shakespeare’s works to audiences that might otherwise not be drawn to them. I have no way of knowing how many in the opening night audience of “Twelfth Night of the Living Dead” were conversant with the original play or with any of The Bard’s canon. Probably more than will be in subsequent performances when fewer friends and theater people occupy the bleacher seats. But if even one person Saturday night in the midst of enjoying watching the zombies chewing the scenery was for a second charmed by the lyricism of Shakespeare, then Loud Fridge Theatre Group has done well by his peerless legacy while having much fun doing it.
            “Twelfth Night of the Living Dead (Or What You Kill)” runs through July 7 at City Heights Performance Annex.