Timothy Mooney’s “Shakespeare’s Histories: Ten Epic Plays at a Breakneck Pace!” has graced the audience with an interesting and entertaining performance of Shakespeare’s historical plays. The audience Saturday Sept. 20 at 7:30 p.m. not only contained Linfield students, but also visiting family members.

Mooney kicked off his performance with a greeting to his audience and he wore Elizabethan costume. He interacted with the audience, even warming them up the audience with a few jokes for their comfort.

He talked about the history of England, from the years of 1066 to 1533; and the War of The Roses between the House of Plantagenet and the houses of Lancaster and York.  He used the ten histories from Shakespeare to explain the power struggle for the throne in England in those centuries.

Mooney not only explained the history aspect, he acted the history through the works of Shakespeare. He took some monologues from each of these plays and recited the ones to emphasis the storytelling of the characters and their part in the war. He delivered his monologues with such character, that the audience clinged to his every word.

He interacted with the audience by including them in the monologues by looking straight at them or gesturing toward them as if they were characters in the scene.

Mooney kept the audience’s attention with these remarks and lifting them up from some of the heaviness of the topic of death. He even poked fun of how characters die in the plays after they predicted their own demise.

“If any character predicts or even worse enacts a prophecy, an event is set into motion which leads to a death,” Mooney said.

Everyone in the audience couldn’t resist a laugh on that one.

Overall, the performance was not only entertaining but very educational and fact-worthy. You didn’t have to be a complete Shakespeare fanatic in order to enjoy the rich history that comes with the works of Shakespeare. Mooney was entertaining and there was never a dull moment during his performance. He made the show what it truly was, a journey through all ten of Shakespeare’s historical masterpieces in a breakneck pace.

Cassandra Martinez can be reached at [email protected].