Who is BARd Shakes, anyway?

BARd Shakes is the Minneapolis, MN, offshoot of Chicago’s Back Room Shakespeare Project. The rules are simple: Serious actors. No director. One rehearsal. In a bar.

BARd Shakes was founded in 2015 by University of Minnesota / Guthrie BFA student Allie Babich, now of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, American Shakespeare Festival, Utah Shakespeare Festival, and more.

BARd is a kind of controlled chaos, somewhere between fine art and a sporting event, where the crowd is encouraged to be raucous, the actors are allowed to take big swings (and occasionally miss), and you can grab a beer or a burger whenever you'd like without judgment from your fellow theatregoers.

It’s Shakespeare like you’ve never seen before.

Meet the captains.

Originally from San Francisco, William Edson went to a Performing Arts High School and the UMN/Guthrie BFA Actor Training Program, which is a long way of saying he is a Barista. He has led more than a dozen BARd shows and plans on leading dozens more, whether you like it or not.

Naomi “Nomes” Cranston Haag hails from Wisconsin and holds a BFA in Acting from Viterbo University. In the spirit of Justin Bieber, she would like to say, “thank you so much— not only to The Bard but to Shakespeare. Because I wouldn't be here without him. He's really blessed me. He's put me in this position. So I want to say thank you so much.”

Naomi’s Fast Facts:

  • Acting with BARd since 2019

  • Captain since 2023

  • Favorite play: Romeo and Juliet

  • Favorite line: “Her eye in heaven would through the airy region stream so bright that birds would sing and think it were not night.”

  • Unforgettable BARd moment: A man came up to me during the middle of our (particularly rowdy) 2023 “Julius Caesar” performance and asked what it was. When I said it was free Shakespeare, he said “Oh, I thought y’all were watching a football game!”

William’s Fast Facts:

  • Acting with BARd since 2017

  • Captain since 2018

  • Favorite play: Twelfth Night

  • Favorite line: “I am a great eater of beef, and I believe it does harm to my wit.”

  • Unforgettable BARd moment: Making my girlfriend of six weeks sub in for Sir Andrew Aguecheek on the day of the performance the last time we did Twelfth Night. Four years later, she’s still here! And still holds it against me…

BARd Shakes performs at Minneapolis Cider Co. in the Marcy Holmes neighborhood of Minneapolis.