Weekend Arts Roundup: Shakespearean Swashbuckling, Smooching, and Other Butlerian Shenanigans

April upon us, Tigers! And despite what T.S. Eliot (and those high school seniors glued to College Confidential) might tell you, the month is bringing us some of the year's most sumptuous weather.  No, that's not a sleep-deprivation-induced mirage: it really is supposed to be in the 70s for the next ten days! Weather gods be praised.And what better way to welcome spring than to relax at a Shakespeare performance in Butler's new Amphitheatre?  This weekend is the opening of PSC's production of Troilus and Cressida, which is being staged outside of New Butler.  The play's cast has already garnered a less-than-welcome status amongst Butlerites: as one Princeton FML-er wrote, "To the weirdos who have nightly sword-fighting sessions in the New Butler Courtyard: I was fine listening to the sound of the blades, but do you really have to yell and scream at each other?"T&C is Shakespeare's retelling of the Illiad's classic story, and is one of his lesser-known plays.  Dan Rattner '13, who plays Paris, cited the play's universality.  "Basically, it's about teenagers growing up and falling in love during a period of politically unpopular war. Which, naturally, means that it is replete with the requisite sword-fights, politically-charged speeches, and gay buttsex."What now?  We're not in Kansas anymore, Tigers: this isn't your typical Shakespeare play.  Macho leather jackets, swashbuckling swordfights, and intense makeout scenes abound: "The play could definitely be read as a giant orgy," said Carolyn Vasko '13, who stars as Cressida.  "The makeout scene between between Agammemnon, Nestor, Patroclus, Achilles and Cressida is one of the strangest things Shakespeare ever wrote."The play also gives you its fair share of bizarre, perverted father figures in period dress: "Cressida's skeevy uncle (played by Dan Gastfriend '13) who sets her up with Troilus looks remarkably like a wizard," said Vasko.  "It is yet to be determined whether or not he has a wand hidden somewhere within his costume. Dan has also threatened multiple times to add Spiderman/Jedi/orcs without telling the director. He says he is waiting for an audience."Do you really need any more inducement? The play runs this weekend and next at 5pm in Butler Ampitheatre: just follow the Butlerian love. Tickets are $8 at the door, and the play is Student-Events Eligible.