The Tragedy of Julius Caesar … but funny

William Shakespeare’s tale about a certain infamous Roman strongman doesn’t mince words about what sort of play it is. It’s right there in the title: The Tragedy of Julius Caesar.

But in a long-running conversation Colorado Shakespeare Festival Producing Artistic Director Tim Orr and acclaimed playwright David Davalos (Wittenberg) began to joke about what characters on the periphery — middle-class strivers, unemployed philosophers, the people cleaning up the bodies, blood and confetti — might be thinking, saying during that play’s momentous events.

This summer, CSF audiences will get to see the results of their running joke with the world premiere of Davalos’ dark, absurd comedy, Friends/Romans/Countrymen.

“It’s a mytho-historic comedy that pulls the supernatural background of Shakespeare’s play into the foreground to explore questions of free will and destiny, the plans of mortals versus the dictates of the gods,” the playwright says.

In the play, a failing young soothsayer and poet bumps into the eponymous dictator and inadvertently helps create the Roman Empire. Think Monty Python’s irreverent Life of Brian by way of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Tom Stoppard’s absurdist take on Hamlet.

Audiences will be laughing, but the not-so-rich-and-famous hoi polloi of ancient Rome won’t be in on the joke.  

“They are citizens who know that the gods, the elements, signs, omens and markers are very real and affecting their lives,” says Orr, who is directing. “They don’t know they are in a comedy.”

The play will run in repertory with Julius Caesar, using the same cast, playing almost all the same characters in each production, and working the same sets.

“The minimalist set evokes ancient Rome, but will subtly work on audiences’ sense of scale, making the characters feel small,” Orr says. “This is a dirty Rome, with dried mud and the lingering smoke of burnt sacrifices.”

“Friends/Romans/Countrymen plays with what the audience knows — and thinks they know — about the world-shaking events in the Rome of 44 BCE,” Orr says. “It’s full of surprises, incredibly funny, and it shows that the difference between tragedy and comedy is often just a question of point of view.”

Tickets for CSF’s 2026 production of Friends/Romans/Countrymen are on sale now at coloradoshakes.org.