Amazon's Precipitation The series was a great boon for Fallout 76attracting new players and restoring focus to the game in its current state. It's a much-needed boost after the game made a lackluster first impression, though the show also inspired something else – the bulk of the recent game Richard III by Wasteland Theater Company. Game Rent spoke with Wasteland Theatre's Acting Artistic Director Jonathan Thomas, known in-game as Bramadew, about their adaptation of Shakespeare's classic in Fallout 76-themed game they call Richard the ghoul.
Dark War never changes, even in Fallout
For the uninitiated: Wasteland Theater Company was born in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, a time that got the company's founders thinking about Shakespeare's era. In the Bard's time, the bubonic plague closed theaters, just as a pandemic closed theaters. There was also a bleak apocalyptic feel to the early days of the pandemic, images of which evoked the idea of a post-social wasteland.
Although other virtual theaters love Final Fantasy 14A Stage Reborn by A Stage Reborn predates the pandemic, today the field remains largely new, fresh for pioneering troupes like Wasteland Theatre. Thus, performing plays like Coriolanus, Romeo and Julietand even Alice in Wonderland adapted for Art Precipitation the setting is still of great historical importance to the performing arts.
The last in this legacy is Richard IIIor as it is called in the Wasteland Theater production, Richard the ghoul. The title may somewhat resemble Walton Goggins' character in the Amazon series, and this is no coincidence. Thomas says that the character of the Werewolf inspired the film adaptation.
“Richard's Disfigurement. We changed it to a ghoul because it's a very common disease you'll encounter in the wasteland. There are wild ghouls and non-wild ghouls, and non-wild ghouls have found a way to integrate into a growing and regenerating society.
To have Richard, who had a history of scoliosis and was considered less than human at the time, and turn him into a ghoul was so easy and it just fit in the universe.”
This is not the only nod PrecipitationThe Amazon series is in play. Since the play involves Richard marrying his cousin, the company borrowed one of Lucy's lines at the beginning of the show: “Sex with your cousin is not a sustainable way to keep the vault alive.” Although aside from those two moments and the choice to put Shady Sands at the center, Thomas said the show had less impact on the game than other parts of the franchise. Thomas said that audiences have responded very well to their adaptation:
“The community itself is very supportive of us; other live streamers, people who make podcasts, make fanfiction or whatever, and they're all very supportive.
They tune into the live streams, they'll even try to get on the server and watch it in person if they can. We've felt the love from the community and people who know about us, and we're very grateful for that.”
How the adaptation meets Fallout and performance art
There are three plays the company is looking at, Thomas explained, and what they do next may be based on which script is performed first. Approaching their success with Shakespeare, there are two out of three options Hamlet and Twelfth nightbut Wasteland Theater occasionally strays from the Bard.
After all, they wrote Lewis Carroll and Charles Dickens, and the third thing they look at is Aristotle Frogs (probably under a humorous name Radtaps). Frogs would draw from Amazon Precipitation series as well, as the corporations of the antebellum world make excellent analogues for the Greek gods:
“You know, in the show where you have a boardroom of various CEOs—Vault-Tec, REPCONN, and RobCo and others—talking about using nukes to have a reason to check the vaults. at the whim of these larger entities in the
Precipitation
; various corporations.We think it translates very well
Frogs
because it's humanity realizing, “Oh, the gods are really in control, and there's really nothing we can do.” We're just at their mercy.”
Let it be Frogs, Twelfth nightor HamletWasteland Theater Company is always accepting new players for its next show. Those interested in joining Wasteland Theater can contact them on X (formerly Twitter) at @76Theatre, although Thomas cautions that most of their work requires the PlayStation version of the game. However, Thomas says they always bring at least one new person to the show and look forward to meeting that new person in their next play.
