Get ready to “party like it’s 1599”, as ShakeItUp Theatre brings an entirely new, improvised Shakespeare play in front of your very eyes! Never in my life as a Literature student, and a Shakespeare enthusiast, did I expect to hear the bard’s tragic tale of “Greasy Dave” and his ventures of finding “a new pigment colour.”
Using Shakespearean language and frequent “asides” (ironically exclaimed out loud), ShakeItUp: The Improvised Shakespeare Show promises a perfectly fun time for all ages — no matter whether you’re able to recite extracts from the playwright’s dramatic works, or know little to none of his plays besides Romeo & Juliet.
The cast of four begin the show by asking the audience to bravely shout-out their worst nemesis. There was a silent hesitation, until the room was humorously filled with loud yells of different names, until the name “Greasy Dave” ultimately got chosen. Dave is revealed to be an ex-manager of an audience member, and like all managers in the chemical pigment industry, he’s described as “deceiving and manipulative” – the perfect protagonist to be our tragic tale’s anti-hero. The four also asked for recommendations on a location for our unique play to be set in, with Karachi winning as Dave ventures to his homeland in Pakistan after winning a war in Cyprus. All actors on stage (Edward Kaye, Olivia Gibbs-Fairley, Caleb Mitchell, and Silvia Manazzone) excelled in their improvised acting, assisted by random lines on paper handed in by the audience that were “stuffed into [their] pantaloons.” With these audience-assisted lines, the cast’s improvisation, and their comical acting, the “opening and closing performance of Greasy Dave” felt like a fever dream.
The performance was amusing to say the least, but it felt like the show was missing a certain vigor. Heading into the show, I was expecting more poetic-styled language jumping between verse and prose, but the speech felt more like a caricature of Shakespeare’s language rather than trying to recreate it — this is not to say that lines like “I do hate thee, and thy ugly face” weren’t side-splittingly hilarious in nature.
I also anticipated more originality in its plot, as the cast completely leaned into the Macbeth-esque narrative. But of course, I understand that every performance is not the same due to its improvised nature, so this may just be a sign to attend one of ShakeItUp Theatre’s shows again, and experience a newly imagined Shakespeare play different from the first.
ShakeItUp: The Improvised Shakespeare Show has now finished it’s run at Fringe 2026.
Image Provided by ShakeItUp Team.
