Dungeons and Shakespeare: Bringing tabletop roleplaying to the Edinburgh Fringe

The world stage of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe is no stranger to experimental theatre, but watching Hamlet roll a critical failure against a Gelatinous Cube is a special kind of magic.

Coming to the Gilded Balloon Patter House this August, Dungeons and Shakespeare blends the chaotic, dice-driven storytelling of tabletop roleplaying games with the classic drama of Shakespeare’s most famous plays. Creator, performer, and Dungeon Master Shelby Bond has already racked up nearly 800 performances across North America, proving that the gap between Elizabethan tragedy and rolling for initiative is much smaller than modern scholars might admit.

Geek Native sat down with Shelby ahead of his Fringe debut to discuss how he balances game mechanics on stage, handling a room full of rowdy players, and what happens when 30 kids dressed as fairies overrun your boss fight.

You are bringing Dungeons and Shakespeare to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe after more than 700 performances across North America. In what ways do you anticipate the notoriously sharp, theatre-literate Edinburgh audience will alter the dynamic and comedy beats of the show compared to your crowds back home?

Shelby Bond: Dungeons & Shakespeare is now nearing 800 shows, and the audiences have been incredibly diverse. Much like a seasoned adventure party, I don’t know what else could be thrown at me that I’m not ready for. I don’t anticipate change, but I know Edinburgh is a wild and fickle beast; bring it on!

As far as the content goes, one of my goals and greatest pleasures is that the show is as loved by 15-year-old gamers, 85-year-old Shakespeare scholars, and people who have no idea about either of those worlds. Shakespeare’s characters are timeless because they represent the human condition and its strongest drives- love, jealousy, vengeance- and that’s what drives any story. After shows kids are glowing because they defeated an Owlbear but at the same time a person is saying to me, “As an English teacher, I’m in love with this.”

Interactive theatre often relies on loose, conversational improvisation, but your show explicitly centres on giant dice rolls and cards drawn live on stage. What specific design problems did you have to solve to ensure that rigid game mechanics enhance the theatrical narrative rather than stalling its pacing?

To make sure the story unfolds in an organic way in a short amount of time, I have to make sure gamers who know and love the rules of D&D understand this will be a simple and fast one-shot. To be honest, although the show was a hit from the get-go, it took me a couple hundred shows to make sure the game mechanics served rather than obstructed the flow of the story and fun. There are times when a roll isn’t necessary or when adding another character from The Bard is just what’s needed.

My original gaming group was heavy on the rules but once several of us were on a long road trip with no way to roll dice. I ended up DMing a quest, realizing I could still conjure the magic of the fantasy by leaning hard into the story. Now, repetition has culled any rough edges as it has been tumbled through the machine of hundreds of shows.

As an alumnus of the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and a Second City graduate, you have deep roots in formal performance. How do you technically structure the “stat blocks” or core character traits of icons like Hamlet or Lady Macbeth so they remain recognisable to literature purists while functioning smoothly within a fantasy quest? Or do you skip stats?

When I first started running these on-stage adventures, I would have the person who volunteered first and drew the hero card roll for that character’s stats. That ended up being cumbersome, however, and now, after I have briefly explained how stats dictate what someone must roll to succeed, I say something like, “What do we think Hamlet’s highest and lowest stat would be?” This is a good example of the broad strokes that help color the quest and form actions and consequences.

In traditional tabletop roleplaying games, the dungeon master holds a chunky amount of narrative control, yet your show puts the ultimate fate of the story into the hands of an audience of hundreds. How do you balance the action economy and narrative spotlight when your “party” is an entire auditorium rather than a small group around a table?

If I try to plan a story, as a traditional DM would do, it actually makes for a bad show. Have you ever been to an improv show where you can tell one of them is forcing their agenda? It’s uncomfortable, right? My job is to create a safe structure then listen closely for clues as to what our characters want. For example, if a player, let’s say as Pericles, states, “I miss my mother’s pies.” I might follow that with something like, “All Pericles wants is to be back home but the road there is perilous.” This gives the story a clear directive toward a final outcome. Throughout that journey, the audience might get to decide who rolls with advantage or if our players head toward the seaside or into an enchanted forest.

The action centers around 6-30 people that come onto stage. The audience feels represented because everyone is a potential player. But the fate of the show is in the hands of those who volunteer to tread the boards.

You have announced that this show is part of a growing universe that includes playable card decks and physical roleplaying modules. When translating a live, chaotic theatrical experience down into cold, hard print and game mechanics for people to play at home, what is your process for preserving that lightning-in-a-bottle spontaneity?

The reason TTRPGs are so popular is because players are stepping into a world where they make choices. It’s empowering and the chaos is thrilling. One of my decks has objects from Shakespeare plays turned into magic items for D&D. How they get found and used just adds to the chaos. If you find the dagger of Brutus it gives you double damage when used against a friendly target. Think how that could affect a story! I want the players, on stage or at the table, to have agency to make their choices and face the consequences. Like an onstage adventure, the printed modules provide a structure for people to live in a world where Shakespeare and fantasy collide.

There is an ongoing debate within the tabletop community over the rise of “actual play” media and live shows; some argue it sets unrealistic expectations for regular home games, while others see it as vital outreach. Where does Dungeons and Shakespeare sit on this spectrum, and how do you ensure the show feels like a genuine celebration of play rather than a passive spectacle?

I see my show on the side of outreach. The theatrical element is an introduction to the concepts of RPGS or Shakespeare. I’m not as focused on accuracy but rather the essence of both.

In the same way that I don’t want just gamers and Shakespeare fans to enjoy the show, I don’t want people to feel like just drama nerds can come up to play. I love it when a mom says something like, “My kid has never been on stage. I can’t believe they got up there and absolutely shined as Puck!” Dungeons & Shakespeare was born out of the pandemic when we felt disconnected. Its whole purpose is to invite unifying play.

In a cultural landscape where mainstream entertainment is increasingly passive, algorithm-driven, and isolated, tabletop roleplaying games offer a stark alternative. From your vantage point on stage, what have these 700 performances taught you about the collective psychological need for adults to engage in unironic, communal pretend?

My study at Royal Central School was centered in the shared experience of theatre, focusing on immersive and experience-based productions. Nothing about this show is passive. Audiences storm the stage. The chaos is cathartic because people aren’t just watching a show, even if they never get out of their seat, the show is theirs. Gamers speak about their in-adventure exploits as if they really happened. They were there at the Elven altar fighting a Gelatinous Cube. If ever there was a time we need to feel that we can overcome if we rise up together, it’s now.

Critics often categorise Shakespeare as high art and tabletop gaming as a niche pop-culture fandom, yet both have deep historical roots in the rowdy, participatory entertainment of the masses. Why do you think modern institutions have spent so long treating these two mediums as entirely incompatible?

I’m not sure why DND and Shakespeare are seen as separate because in my heart they have never been separate. They were both born from the same mythical source.

T’was the magic of The Bard that first enticed me. The fairy folk of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the spells they cast lit the fire that would set my course in life. To open the gates for more fantasy to pour into the plays of dear Shakes just seems natural. There is room for all these to exist together, “For death-like dragons here affright thee…”

With a career spanning 25 years and performances for over a million people, you have witnessed major shifts in how audiences interact with live art. What does a genuinely “successful” performance of Dungeons and Shakespeare look like to you personally, away from sell-out figures or box office metrics?

I know it’s been a great show when I’m onstage afterwards and I hear people that didn’t know each other an hour ago talking like friends and cheering the players as heroes. I have heard people say for the rest of a festival people yell to them from across the street things like, “Hey it’s Titania! Cast fireball!” A woman who playing the Nurse from R&J stands over the corpse of a Hobgoblin Warlord, having won back the respect of the citizens of Verona. A kid playing the Gravedigger from Hamlet points at a vampire spawn and cries out, “Yours will be the last grave I dig!” This is what I live for.

Improvised storytelling inherently requires a massive amount of vulnerability from the players. How do you go about creating an immediate sense of psychological safety in a festival venue so that a room full of strangers feels comfortable shouting out choices and steering the fate of the characters?

I am both into arts and RPGs so I strive to create a safe space by showing up in a way that’s vulnerable and encouraging.

I have been told “That which is most personal is most universal.” The things we think no one would understand about us is usually what connects us to others, finds our kindred spirits. Those in the arts and those into RPGs are often the ones that feel they don’t fit into societal expectations. I arrive with my heart on my sleeve to create a space for us weirdos and nerds to realize we are so far from alone.

Looking back at the evolution of the show, what is the most spectacular failure you experienced on stage, and how did that specific disaster characterise or reshape the current iteration of the system?

At a big show at the Bristol Renaissance Faire near Chicago there were a couple little kids dressed as fairies who wanted to come up to be the final boss. They both wanted it so bad that I said, “You know what? Any kid dressed as a fairy can come up here.” Seconds later I realized the folly of my words as about 30 children with fairy wings descended onto the stage. I was frozen for a moment in disbelief, but the show must go on so I got one frilly fae to choose the monster and she drew a Creeping Claw which is an undead disembodied hand. 30 bedazzled fairies got on all fours and began, for some reason, to growl. Juliet rolled a 3 to their 18 and I had to navigate our hero’s wild death scene as a squad of terrifying and adorable killer kids unleashed carnage.

I now know to be more mindful of what I say but the only one that truly regretted their fate was poor Juliet.

I accidentally created a swarm on stage and now occasionally create anarchy on purpose because I know I can handle it. It was a disaster that I don’t regret, but Juliet did.

Thanks, Shelby!

Quick Links

Dungeons and Shakespeare runs at 13:35 at Gilded Balloon Patter House (Other Yin) from 5th – 27th August (excluding 13th August). Tickets and venue details are available directly via Gilded Balloon.