Past Productions
The Bedlam Faction staged its first project, a critically acclaimed production of Ben Jonson's Volpone, in the spring of 2001. To our delight, the play drew fantastic reviews, made some top ten lists, and pulled in two B. Iden Payne award nominations (Anne Engleking for Best Supporting Actress and Robert Deike for Best Supporting Actor).
Energized, we jumped into our second production. After so high-minded a comedy as Volpone, we decided to plumb the depths of ordinary old farce with Edward Ravenscroft's Restoration-era sex comedy, The London Cuckolds. Cuckolds nearly doubled our audience and was nominated for three Austin Critic's Table awards (Best Comedy; Emily Abrams for Best Actress in a Comedy; and Shannon Grounds for Best Actress in a Comedy).
In the early summer of 2002, the Faction presented the darkly ironic comedy Romulus, exploring the more serious end of the comedic spectrum and getting back in touch with the twentieth century. This production garnered three B. Iden Payne nominations (John Botti and crew for Best Original Score; Robert Deike for Best Supporting Actor, and Shannon Grounds for Best Supporting Actress) and a Critic's Table nomination (Greg Gondek for Best Supporting Actor, Comedy).
Our 2002-2003 season featured a re-make of the 1930's government-propaganda film Reefer Madness and John Ford's darkly compelling tale of sibling love, 'Tis Pity She's a Whore, for which Carie Esquenazi earned a Critic's Table nomination for Best Supporting Actress. For that season's work, we also received a special Critic's Table award for "Most Creative Public Relations."
2003-2004 opened in November with Emperor of the Moon, a glittery quasi-musical romp by England's first public female playwright, Aphra Behn, at the Austin Playhouse. Emperor of the Moon added three more B. Iden Payne nominations to the collection (Cast and Crew for Best Production of a Comedy; Andy Bond and Robert Matney for Best Featured Actor). In the spring of 2004, The Bedlam Faction initiated yet another new line of dramatic genre, staging the world premier of local playwright Wayne Allen Brenner’s Screwed Into the Book of Love, a pageant of monologues charting the delights, distractions, and disasters of love.
In 2004-2005, we revisited our performance roots as we turn at long last to Shakespeare, for a frolic with the wry couples and rhymed couplets of Love's Labor's Lost. Shakespeare’s play explores the license–and the limits—of romantic comedy, first celebrating and then questioning the ageless conventions of the comedy genre.
The spring of 2005 saw our first revival, as we re-mounted our surprise sold-out hit, 2003’s original adaptation of Reefer Madness. We closed out 04-05 with a Frontera Fest short, "67," a dramatization of our funding application to the city of Austin.
In October of 2006, we brought the first part of an ongoing project on Shakespeare's Sonnets to Arts Encounters at the Beninis'. We return to the stage in March of 2008 with Paul Menzer's new comedy, The Brats of ClarenceFrom the moment the original cast of Volpone signed on as the original company members in the bliss and glow of youthful enthusiasm, we decided we would confront every choice with the determination to remove boundaries and obstacles, rather than be limited by them. We remain committed to broadening our horizons in our selections of plays, and to employing ensemble direction as we bring them to the stage.