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Eric Paterniani is Launce in "The Two Gentlemen Of Verona" for Bryant Park Shakespeare


Eric Paterniani, Bryant Park

The Drilling Company, known for its intrepid, bare-boned Shakespeare in the Parking Lot productions, made its Bryant Park debut last spring with "Hamlet," the inaugural production of Bryant Park Shakespeare where Eric Paterniani played the character of Bernardo.

This year, the troupe has been invited back by Bryant Park and it will present "The Two Gentlemen Of Verona".

This free Shakespeare production, directed by Hamilton Clancy, will be offered from May 15th to May 31st, Friday and Saturday at 6.30 pm and Sunday at 2 pm in Bryant Park, where food kiosks serve affordable meals, capacious rest rooms are close at hand and seating on bistro chairs is guaranteed for everyone. Best of all, there will be no waiting in line for tickets.

"The Two Gentlemen of Verona" is Shakespeare's first comedy about being in love with love. It adopts the device of making Italy the spiritual home of its comic characters, arousing a mood of strange wonder and the same time, making this wonder seem real and true. Could anybody resist transferring this play to Little Italy? While Valentine and Proteus move from Verona to Milan, the characters in this production move from working at one establishment to another. Boy meets girl, boy loves girl, boy's best friend meets girl and also loves girl. To director Hamilton Clancy, the spirit of joy and adventure that all these mismatched lovers have is the spirit that many people come to NYC with. "In making the world of the play smaller," he says, "we are calling attention to the larger journeys of the heart that all the characters take."

Eric Paterniani will portray the role of Launce, Proteus' silly and melancholic servant, who will be accompained on stage by Chewy, a dog described as "a kind of a terrier", who will perform as Crab, Launce's beloved cur.

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