Chatting With - The Bard Busker
Arthur L Wood is a fellow student of drama at The University of Winchester and a self confessed Shakespeare fab boy. His performance Bard Buskers is a one man show of Arthur’s favourite Shakespeare sonnets and monologues which is expansive and Arthur then offers the audience to request what they would like to hear from the Bard’s famous works.
When speaking to Arthur before the afternoon show he had been trying out his material in the Brook’s Shopping centre lifts, often receiving reactions of embarrassment, but also appreciation as he said one gentleman stayed in the lift for several journeys just to watch and listen.
Arthur began with the classic To be or not to be, then moved onto Benedick’s monologue from Much Ado About Nothing that featured his girlfriend and drama student Charlie Teschner, then “my Mother’s favourite”, St Crispin’s Day from Henry V and a requested speech; Prospero’s final lines from The Tempest. Arthur’s voice was steady, paced and expressive with the personal touch of a light whistle on ‘s’ sounds that gave a song like quality to his tone. He had no issues recalling reams of text written hundreds of year before his time, a testament to the effort and skill that has gone into his street shows.
Arthur hopes to expand his Bard Buskers show to include more talented students who have a love of Shakespeare, touring the streets of Winchester and possibly beyond – watch this space.