Falconbridge Players

Founded in 2019, Falconbridge Players brings classic scripts to life in the Madison, Wisconsin area. Through workshops, staged readings, pop-up performances, and full-scale productions, we tell timeless tales with a rebel mindset.

Performers, directors, adaptors, and dramaturgs are invited to collaborate with Falconbridge Players.

Our Patron in Absentia: Thomas Neville, the Bastard Falconbridge

We take our name from Thomas Neville, who appears in the historical play Edward the Fourth as Falconbridge, a supporter of Henry the Sixth who lays siege to London. Thomas was the natural son of Sir William Neville, 6th Baron Fauconberg (alternately Falconbridge and Faulconbridge) and 1st Earl of Kent. Known as Thomas the Bastard or the Bastard Falconbridge, he was executed for his crimes against the state on September 27, 1471, a stirring moment dramatized by the playwright Thomas Heywood (probably):

Headsman. Forgive me, sir, your death.
Come, and yield your head gently to the block.

Falconbridge. Gently, say’st thou ? thou wilt not use me so.
But all is one for that. What strength thou hast.
Throughout the whole proportion of thy limbs.
Revoke it all into thy manly arms,
And spare me not. I am a gentleman,
A Neville, and a Falconbridge beside :
Then do thy work : thou mayst get credit by it ;
For, if thou dost not, I must tell thee plain,
I shall be passing angry when ’tis done.

Headsman. I warrant you, sir : none in the land shall do it better.

Predecessors the Lord and Lady Falconbridge appear briefly in Shakespeare’s King John, Act I Scene 1. (They are not memorably killed.)