Wednesday, September 24, 2025
Come meet with filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman at 6 pm in RTFP 184. We'll watch #ShakespearesShitstorm and talk about the film, Troma Productions, and Kaufman's career.

#ShakespearesShitstorm

Poster image of mad scientist, TVs, and lighting and snow in the background.The Opioid Epidemic is destroying America. Legendary director Lloyd Kaufman celebrates Troma’s 45th and his 50th year making movies, by taking on Big Pharma, addiction and the intolerance of social media in #ShakespearesShitstorm. This irreverent musical adaptation of “The Tempest” is ripe with bawdy couplets, Hieronymus Boschian images of excess and unrefined iambic pentameter.˝

#ShakepearesShitstorm marks the most ambitious project in Troma’s 45 year history. Working with one of Hollywood’s best special effects companies, Troma brings a whole new experience to their stylized brand. Having a bigger budget also brought about larger scale on-location filming in Albania (a first for narrative feature films in the country) as well as a celestial orchestral score from Portugal and a little help from the Bard. Shakespeare has never been this raw and unfiltered.  Watch the trailer here!

Portrait of Kaufman wearing a red bow tie looking up and to the left. He has a salt and pepper beard.

Lloyd Kaufman

The Troma Universe was born in 1974 with a series of highly original, raunchy comedies such as SQUEEZE PLAY!, STUCK ON YOU!, WAITRESS!, and other titles ending with an exclamation point. These movies, independent precursors to such later smash hits as National Lampoon’s Animal House and Porky’s, did well financially, although Kaufman continued to work on such outside productions as ROCKY and SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER. Kaufman’s relationship with mainstream Hollywood would not last long. “There were problems,” Kaufman said, “as I always wanted to do things my own way and my employers insisted I do things the correct way.” He continued to build up a list of impressive credits as well as some overpowering debts.

Kaufman proved his former employers wrong with his 1984 breakthrough movie, THE TOXIC AVENGER. This tale of a health club mop boy named Melvin who is transformed into a hideously deformed creature of superhuman size and strength struck a chord with audiences and critics alike, demonstrating that there were a large number of people who were interested in seeing things done Kaufman’s way. 

The success of THE TOXIC AVENGER was followed by a string of commercial and artistic triumphs in a similar vein, blending fantasy, heavy action, comedy, and eroticism in a style that can only be described as “Tromatic.” These films, including the CLASS OF NUKE ‘EM HIGH series, SGT. KABUKIMAN, N.Y.P.D., and TROMA’S WAR, were often ignored or scorned by the intelligentsia of the time but spoke to an entire generation of young people who rejected the pandering, commercial films of the mid-to-late 80’s. Some of these Troma fans went on to become filmmakers themselves, including Quentin Tarantino, Kevin Smith, Mike Judge, Peter Jackson, and Trey Parker.