Director Evelyn Bukac first studied The Two Noble Kinsmen in school, where it was compared to better-known plays like Othello.
“I've always had a proclivity towards works that tend to fall into the cracks. I don't know if that's just a personality thing or if there's something romantic about them, to me, but The Two Noble Kinsmen chose a theme, and it stuck to it so well,” Bukac said.
Bukac, now a High School senior, describes the play as a tragicomedy that looks at all kinds of love, including romantic, platonic and familial. William Shakespeare and John Fletcher co-wrote the play.
Bukac, who uses the pronoun they, helped found the collective and has been involved in every production since its launch, including as an assistant director in the most recent production. This will be their first time directing.
Bukac read nearly 50 plays over the summer before choosing Two Noble Kinsmen for the fall production.
The original script runs about 3,000 lines, or nearly three hours of stage time. Bukac is cutting it down to make the show more manageable. They said the language can feel intimidating, but they hope audiences will see it differently.
“It's just something that people don't want to touch because they're like, Oh no, that's so tricky, and the language is weird and it's pretentious, but I think when you really crack into it, you realize, oh, no wait, this guy was an absolute riot. He's just having a good time,” Bukac said.
The intent is not to put on a strict, by-the-book Shakespearean production – they want to make it fun for the community.
Artistic Director Meegan Miller directed the group’s previous shows. She’s an adult who helped launch the collective in 2023 as the Seward High School Theatre Collective, with five shows under its belt, including Little Women and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
It has since grown into a community group. Miller said the group recently dropped “High School” from its name.
“Now we're doing a kind of a joint merger, and trying to become more of a community theater as well as still involving the high school students quite heavily and hopefully offering them credit throughout the process as well,” Miller said.
Performances of The Two Noble Kinsmen are scheduled for two weekends in November and will close on the 17th.
