The experience of the COVID-19 pandemic infuses Cain's humane comedy, as evidenced by Ruth's relentless tidying and Shakespeare's blithe, ignorant dismissal that it will only last a few days. He's arrogant, the world revolves around him, but he shows himself willing to learn what these two can teach him.

He's also a typical writer in a stage production, flinging crumpled paper around as he moans and kvetches about the play he's trying to write. After all, she's the hostess keeping them alive during this crisis.Īs written by Cain, Mark Ulrich's Shakespeare is a well-off man of the world in a hurry. But he's not afraid to upbraid Shakespeare for his illegible penmanship or, more seriously, for his thoughtlessness in treating Ruth as a serving wench. Zach Thomas Woods infuses zany comic energy into Edgar, a young Scottish lawyer and scrivener (a copier of documents), sternly religious but desperately horny and infatuated with Ruth. As Shakespeare learns when she takes apart 'Hamlet,' she knows something about storytelling, too.

Sounds like a set-up for a joke, right? But the rich performances of the actors who embiggen those potential stereotypes have much to do with the success of Next Act Theatre's new production, which opened Friday evening.Īs Ruth, the play's sanest character, Eva Nimmer is brusque in business dealings and kind in human relations, with hidden depths she keeps revealing, even until the end of the play. Harold Bloom loftily credited William Shakespeare the writer with 'the invention of the human.'īut Shakespeare the character in Bill Cain's world premiere comedy 'God's Spies,' sequestered by plague and trying to write 'King Lear,' learns a lot about being human from the two people he's stuck in lockdown with: a lawyer and a prostitute. View Gallery: Photos: 'God's Spies,' performed by Next Act Theatre

Shakespeare by Harold Bloom