Living Dead in Denmark

The torso of a man wearing a tattered shirt that is muddied and splattered with blood. Text reads "Living Dead in Denmark."

Living Dead in Denmark

Written by Qui Nguyen 
Directed by Tlaloc Rivas 

October 9-19, 2025 
Nafe Katter Theatre 

recommended for audiences 12+

TICKET PRICING:
Adults: $42, $37, $32
Seniors: $35, $30, $25
Students: $15, $12
Children: $15, $12

see content information

Zombies meet Shakespeare in this action-adventure sequel to Hamlet. Five years after that fateful sword fight, the undead have risen to power and are trying to take over the world. But those brain-hungry monsters did not count on Fortinbras conjuring Lady M, Juliet, and Ophelia to fight for the opposition. A perfect Halloween adventure! 

Using HAMLET as a jumping-off point, Nguyen throws in martial arts, horror movies, pop songs, puppetry, and comic books. Eat your heart out, Ed Wood …” ⁠ – Backstage

Portrait of playwright Qui Nguyen, an Asian man with black glasses, wearing a pink button-down shirt and nonchalantly holding a sword.

Qui Nguyen

playwright

Qui Nguyen is a playwright, screenwriter, and co-founder of the Obie Award-winning Vampire Cowboys Theatre Company of NYC.

His plays include Vietgone (2016 Harold and Mimi Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award, 2016 LADCC Tim Schmitt Award, 2016 Edward M. Kennedy Prize finalist); War is F**king Awesome (Frederick Loewe Award); She Kills Monsters (2014 AATE Distinguished Play Award, 2012 GLAAD Media Award nom); Soul Samurai (2009 GLAAD Media Award nom); and the critically acclaimed Vampire Cowboys shows: The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G, Alice in Slasherland, Fight Girl Battle World, Men of Steel, Six Rounds of Vengeance and Living Dead in Denmark.

Recent awards include a 2016 Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing in a Preschool Animated Program (Peg+Cat) and a 2015 New York Community Trust Helen Merrill Playwriting Award. He is proud member of the WGA, The Dramatists Guild, The Playwrights Center, Ensemble Studio Theatre, and The Ma-Yi Writers Lab. He’s an alumnus of New Dramatists and Youngblood. For television, he’s written for PBS’s Peg+Cat and SYFY’s Incorporated. Currently, he’s a screenwriter for Marvel Studios.

Portrait of director Tlaloc Rivas, a Latinx man with greying hair and a short beard.

Tlaloc Rivas

director

Tlaloc Rivas (he/el) is a playwright, director, and educator based in Central Connecticut (unyielded lands of the Mohegan, Nipmuc, and Pequot nations).

He is currently Lecturer in Acting at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale, Associate Professor in Residence in Theatre Studies at the University of Connecticut, and on the faculty at the National Theatre Institute at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center.

Tlaloc was the inaugural Presidential Postdoctoral Presidential Fellow for Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Drama and currently serves on the boards for The New Harmony Project and the Latiné New Musical Theatre Lab.

Tlaloc is a member of Stage Directors and Choreographers, the Dramatists Guild, and co-founder of the Latinx Theatre Commons. He is the recipient of the Sir John Gielgud Fellowship in Classical Directing, the NEA/TCG Career Development Program for Directors, ​and a Usual Suspect for New York Theater Workshop.

Performances: 

Thursday, October 9, 7:30pm, Preview
Friday, October 10, 8pm, Opening 
Saturday, October 11, 8pm 
Tuesday, October 14, 10am Student Matinee (call 860-486-2113 to book your class) 
Wednesday, October 15, 7:30pm 
Thursday, October 16, 7:30, $5 Students, Post-show Talkback 
Friday, October 17, 8pm 
Saturday, October 18, 2pm, Post-show Talkback 
Saturday, October 18, 8pm 
Sunday, October 19, 2pm, Mask required performance, Closing 

Living Dead in Denmark Cast

Portrait of a white graduate student with a big smile and strawberry blond facial hair.

Bryan Anderson

Portrait of Sandy Borrero, a smiling hispanic graduate student with long straight dark hair.

Sandy Borrero

Portrait of a college student with thick dark hair and bushy eyebrows, wearing a burgundy polo shirt.

Beau Brennan

Portrait of Halli Gibson, a graduate student with long curly dark hair, wearing and pale rose colored top, standing in front of a royal blue backdrop..

Halli Gibson

Portrait of Jaihui Guo, an Asian graduate student with wavy black hair and dark t-shirt

Jiahui Guo

Portrait of Lia Crosby, college student with long black straight hair, and big dark eyes, wearing a grey-blue top with a square neckline.

Lia Marie

Portrait of Chris Martin, a white graduate student with slicked-back strawberry blonde hair wearing a green knit shirt.

Chris Martin

Portrait of Daniel Pawlyk, a white college student with tousled hair, wearing a black t-shirt.

Daniel Pawlyk

Portrait of Mark Sadowski, a college student with dark hair and an angular ace, wearing an open button down and dark t-shirt

Mark Sadowski

Portrait of a smiling student with long brown hair, wearing a blue t-shirt.

Marie Sawyer

Portrait of Julia Smith, a white college student with long, straight auburn hair and a big smile

Julia Smith

Portrait of Marieangelie Velez, an hispanic graduate student with long dark hair and big brawn eyes, wearing a black tank top

Mariangelie Veléz

Living Dead in Denmark Design & Production Team

Portrait of an older gentleman with thick rimmed round glasses and white mustache, wearing a black t-shirt

Michael Chybowski

Portrait of Ali Etesamifar, a bearded middle-eastern man wearing a hat with his arm around a lion puppet.

Ali Etesamifar

Portrait of Brad Fraser, a white man with short cropped hair and facial hair, smile broadly at the camera

Brad Fraizer

Portrait of a smiling white man wearing a dark polo shirt.

Michael Kaplan

Portrait of Jake Neighbors, a white person with stylish rectangular glasses, blondish handlebar mustache and goatee.

Jake Neighbors

Portrait of a smiling white student with medium length dark hair and bangs, wearing wired-rimmed glasses and a white tank top.

Harley Niger

Portrait of a college student with her light brown hair pulled back, smiling and wearing a jean jacket.

Annalise Otano

Portrait of Lilian Ransjin, a white professor with straight blond hair, wearing a black top, smiling at the camera

Lillian Ransijn

Portrait of Alison Savino, a white woman with short straight brown hair, wearing a denim shirt

Alison Savino

Portrait of Emma Sowards, a white graduate student with her dark hair pulled back, wearing a grey cardigan and round glasses.

Emma Sowards

Portrait of a student with wavy brown hair, on a dock with water in the background

Madison Szymaszek

Portrait of Anna Tenner, a young white woman with medium length brown hair, smiling at the camera

Anna Tenner

Portait of Hannah Trobaugh, a white graduate student with long, wavy, dark hair and a big smile.

Hannah Trobaugh

Portrait of an Asian graduate student with dark hair in a ponytail, wearing a dark blue t-shirt.

Siyi Xiang

Design & Production Team:

Scenic Design – Siyi Xiang
Lighting Design – Michael Chybowski
Costume Design – Emma Sowards
Sound Design – Jake Neighbors
Puppet Design – Ali Etesamifar
Makeup Design – Madison Szymaszek 

Fight Choreography – Brad Fraizer
Fight Captain– Chris Martin
Intimacy Coordinator – Lillian Ransijn
Voice & Dialect Coach – Michael Kaplan
Assistant Director – Annalise Otano
Dramaturgy – Harley Niger

Production Stage Manager – Alison Savino
Stage Manager – Anna Tenner
Assistant Stage Managers – Jack Regan, Cassidy Smith 

Assistant Lighting Designer – Kimani Gordon
Production Electrician – Aiden Shea
Assistant Production Electricians – Tom Osmond, Kelly Berman
Assistant Costume Designers – Mia Carini, Davis Keaney
Technical Director – Hannah Trobaugh
Assistant Technical Director – Layla Montgomery

Cast:

Ophelia – Halli Gibson
Lady Macbeth – Sandy Borrero
Puck, Orderly, Taylor Swift, Ninja Zombie – Mariangelie Vélez
Juliet – Julia Smith
Titania, Weird Sister, Ensemble – Lia Marie
Fortinbras, Macduff, Ensemble – Bryan Anderson
Guildenstern, Caliban, Peaseblossom, Puppeteer, Ensemble – Jiahui Guo                     
Ghost/Hamlet – Chris Martin                  
Rosencrantz, Tybalt, Oberon, Gravedigger, Ensemble – Mark Sadowski
Horatio, Ensemble – Daniel Pawlyk
Laertes, Puppeteer, Ensemble – Beau Brennon
Puppeteer, Ensemble – Marie Sawyer

Understudies – Danny Reyes, Jimena Rivera, Vidal Rivadeneyra Serna

Coming soon to CRT:

As You Like It (musical)
Darling
Three Musketeers 1941
One Acts
Connecticut Repertory Theatre: PLAY

CRT BOX OFFICE | 860-486-2113 | crtboxoffice@uconn.edu