Event

Long Island Richard

"Long Island Richard" follows a modern-day Richard III and his desperate struggle for success amidst a cauldron of greed, violence, and betrayal. Combining dialogue from Richard III with text and characters from additional Shakespearean plays, "Long Island Richard" paints a portrait of a familiar American locale that is relentlessly ordinary and starkly horrifying.

Many adaptations of Shakespeare avail themselves of updated time periods in order to help audiences better understand Shakespeare's work. "Long Island Richard" turns this tradition on its head by employing Shakespeare in order to examine a familiar landscape in contemporary America.

Built on economic aspiration, manufactured pastoral settings, and white flight, Long Island looms large in the development of postwar America as one of the country's first large-scale suburbs. Given its history as a prototype for the rest of the nation, it is an apt location to investigate workings within the country writ large.

Building on previous Straddler theatrical productions, "Long Island Richard" is the company's first film.

The Straddler is an interdisciplinary organization founded in 2007 with the intent of examining and transforming contemporary culture. Our magazine, The Straddler, is available at thestraddler.com. Looking as much to the past as to the present for insights into an age where repetition and cultural diminishment are the norm, The Straddler sifts through illuminated bits of Western and American culture. Pieced together, we believe these fragments offer images of the potential for a more dignified cultural future.