Oregon Shakespeare Festival
Encyclopedia
The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) is a regional repertory theatre
in Ashland, Oregon
, United States
. The festival annually produces eleven plays on three stages during a season that lasts from February to October. Approximately half of the plays produced each year are by William Shakespeare
.
and completing the second and third cycles through the works in 1978 and 1997. Since 2000, there has also been at least one new work each season from playwrights such as Octavio Solis and Robert Schenkkan
.
In addition to the plays, a free outdoor "Green Show" precedes the evening plays from June through October. Originally, it offered Elizabethan music and dancers. From 1966 till 2007, it consisted of three shows in rotation inspired by the plays showing in the Elizabethan Theatre. Live music was supplied by the Terra Nova Consort and other guest musicians and modern dance was performed by Dance Kaleidoscope, a modern dance group. In 2008, the Green Show was revamped. Performers may include a dance group from Mexico or India, clowns doing ballet on stilts, jugglers, or a fire show. OSF actors might showcase their musical talents. Improv, metal, or rock-n-roll variations on Shakespeare might be seen. Individual performers, groups, choirs, bands, and orchestras may present Afro-Cuban, baroque, blues, classical, contemporary, cowboy, funk, gospel, hip-hop, jazz, mariachi, marimba, poetry, marionette, renaissance, or salsa, sometimes combined in unexpected ways. Performers are drawn from throughout the Northwest and California.
The festival presents 750-800 performances of eleven plays in three theatres from February through October each year, with a total average audience of 375,000 to 400,000. The company consists of about 325 full-time personnel, including over 100 actors, 175 part-time support personnel, and approximately 600 volunteers.
The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is listed as a Major Festival in the book Shakespeare Festivals Around the World.
movement of the late 1800s. In 1893, the residents of Ashland built a facility that hosted its first performance on 5 July. The building was expanded in 1905, and in its heyday, accommodated audiences of 1500 for appearances by the likes of John Phillip Sousa and William Jennings Bryan
during annual 10-day seasons.
In 1917, a new domed structure was built at the site, but it fell into disrepair after the Chautauqua movement died out in the 1920s. In 1935, the similarity of the remaining wall of the by now roofless Chautauqua building to Elizabethan theatres inspired Southern Oregon Normal School
drama professor Angus L. Bowmer
to propose using it to present plays by Shakespeare. Ashland city leaders granted him a sum "not to exceed US$
400" (US$5,600 2005 est.) to present two plays as part of the city's Independence Day
celebration. However, they pressed Bowmer to add boxing matches to cover the expected deficit. Bowmer agreed, feeling such an event was in perfect keeping with the bawdiness of Elizabethan theatre
, and the performances went forward. The Works Progress Administration
helped construct a makeshift Elizabethan stage on the Chautauqua site, and confidently billed as the "First Annual Oregon Shakespearean Festival", Bowmer presented Twelfth Night
on July 2 and July 4, 1935 and The Merchant of Venice
on July 3, with Bowmer directing and playing the lead roles in both plays. Reserved seats cost US$1, with general admission of US$.50 for adults and US$.25 for children (US$13.80, US$6.90, and US$3.45 2005 est.). Ironically, it was the profit from the plays that covered the losses the boxing matches incurred.
The festival has continued ever since, excepting 1941–46, when Bowmer served in World War II
, and quickly developed a reputation for quality productions. In 1939, OSF took a production of The Taming of the Shrew
to the Golden Gate International Exposition
in San Francisco, California
that was nationally broadcast on radio. The lead actress, learning at the last minute the broadcast would be to a national audience, suffered a panic attack, was rushed to the hospital and the stand-in took over. The scripts didn’t arrive on the set until three minutes before air time. The Festival achieved widespread national recognition when, from 1951 to 1973, NBC broadcast abbreviated performances each year that were carried by more than 100 stations and, after 1954 on Armed Forces Radio and Radio Free Europe. The programs won favorable review from critics and for the first time people began to come from around the country. The programs led Life magazine to do a story on the Festival in 1957, bringing even more people to the plays. The NBC programs and the subsequent attention go a long way to explaining the mystery of how a tiny out-of-the-way timber town in the Northwest became a theatrical and tourist Mecca.
A second playhouse, the indoor Angus Bowmer Theatre, opened in 1970, enabling OSF to expand its season into the spring and fall; within a year, attendance tripled to 150,000. Bowmer retired in 1971, and leadership of the festival passed to Jerry Turner, a respected actor/director and later a translator of Henrik Ibsen
and August Strindberg
. Turner opened OSF's third theatre, the Black Swan, in 1977, and festival attendance soon reached 300,000. In 1983 OSF won a Tony Award
for achievement in regional theatre. Five years later, the Oregon Shakespearean Festival was renamed the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. At the invitation of the City of Portland
, from 1988–1994, OSF established a resident theatre in the Portland Center for the Performing Arts
, which later spun off to independence as Portland Center Stage
. Those six seasons ran from November-April, and company members often worked in both cities.
Turner retired in 1991 and actor/director Henry Woronicz
took control for five seasons. 1992 saw the opening of the Allen Pavilion, which encircled the open-air seating area within the walls of the Elizabethan Theatre.
When Woronicz left in 1996, OSF recruited Libby Appel
from the highly respected Indiana Repertory Theatre
, and a guest director at OSF from 1988 to 1991, as artistic director. In 1997, the OSF-commissioned The Magic Fire was presented at the John F. Kennedy Center and named by Time
among the year's best plays. In 2001, the ten millionth ticket to an OSF performance was sold. In 2002, the New Theatre replaced the Black Swan as the venue for small, experimental productions in a Black box theatre
. In 2003, Time named OSF as the second best regional theatre in the United States (Chicago's Goodman Theater was first).
Appel was succeeded in 2008 as Artistic Director by Bill Rauch
. Rauch was the artistic director and co-founder of the Cornerstone Theater Company
in Los Angeles and had directed plays previously at OSF. He is making direct connections between classic plays and contemporary concerns, exploring beyond the Western canon
to incorporate Asian and African epics into the Festival, and reaching out to youth. Inspired by Shakespeare's history plays, he has initiated a series of original plays focusing on American history. While continuing to work with established playwrights, he has commissioned works by new ones, and has initiated the Black Swan Lab to develop new works for the stage. His work resulted in his receiving the Margo Jones Award recognizing his impact on American theatre in 2009.
A $400,000 grant from the Collins Foundation has enabled OSF to initiate a ten-year plan to create a series of up to thirty-seven original plays in American Revolutions: the United States History Cycle under the supervision of OSF Associate Director Allison Carey. Thirty-seven plays, matching the total number of plays Shakespeare wrote, aims at understanding our national identity. American Night, by Richard Montoya, Ric Salinas, and Herbert Siguenza of Culture Clash
, the first play in the series, was presented as part of the 2010 season, and proved so popular that for the first time in OSF history, was expanded to include extra performances. Ghost Light, by Jonathan Moscone of California Shakespeare Theater
and Tony Taccone
of Berkeley Repertory Theatre
, the second in the series, was presented as part of the 2011 series. Five additional plays have been contracted with the following playwrights:
1988 Tony Award
winner David Henry Hwang
Guggenheim and 2007 MacArthur Fellow Lynn Nottage
2002 Pulitzer Prize
winner Robert Schenkkan
1999 MacArthur Fellow Naomi Wallace
2001 MacArthur Fellow and 2002 Pulitzer Prize winner Suzan-Lori Parks
.
The Oregon Shakespeare Festival occupies a 4 acres (16,187.4 m²) campus adjacent to Lithia Park
and the Plaza in Ashland, Oregon. The primary buildings are the three theatres, Carpenter Hall, and the Camps, Pioneer, and Administration buildings, all surrounding an open central court, locally known as “The Festival Courtyard." The Festival Courtyard ties the three theatres together into an architectural whole and facilitates movement. It also provides a stage for the nightly Green Shows from June through September. Other facilities include the costume warehouse, costume shop, production and plant shops, classrooms, and rehearsal spaces.
on the back of an envelope based on his recollection of productions at the University of Washington in which he had acted as a student. Ashland, Oregon
obtained WPA funds in 1935 to build it in the roofless shell of the abandoned Chautauqua
theatre, the 12 feet (3.7 m) circular walls which remained after the dome had been removed. Bowmer extended the walls to reduce the stage width to fifty-five feet, and painted the extensions to resemble half-timbered buildings. He designed a thrust stage—one projecting toward the audience—with a balcony. Two columns helped divide the main stage into forestage, middle stage, and inner stage areas. Fifty cent general admission seating was on benches just behind the one dollar reserved seating on folding chairs. This theatre was torn down during World War II.
drama professor John Conway. The main stage became trapezoidal, with entries added on either side, and windows added above them flanking the balcony stage. A low railing gave a finished appearance to the forestage. Chairs arranged to improve sight lines replaced bench seating. Backstage areas were added gradually and haphazardly, until the ramshackle result was ordered torn down as a fire hazard in 1958.
The next year saw the opening of the current outdoor Elizabethan Theatre, patterned on London's 1599 Fortune Theatre
. Designed by Richard Hay
, it incorporated all the stage dimensions mentioned in the Fortune contract. The trapezoidal stage was retained but the façade was extended to three stories, resulting in a forestage, middle stage, inner below, inner above (the old balcony), and a musicians' gallery. The wings were provided with second-story windows. Each provides acting areas, creating many staging possibilities. A pitched, shingled roof enhances the half-timbered façade. A windowed gable was extended from the center of the roof to cover and define the middle stage. Just before each performance, an actor opens the gable window, and in keeping with Elizabethan tradition signaling a play in progress, runs a flag up the pole to the sound of a trumpet and doffs his cap to the audience.
The result is not an exact replica of the Fortune Theatre. The known but incomplete dimensions apply only to the stage. The original specifications sometimes say no more than "to be built like the Globe," for which there are no plans or details. The remotely operated lighting, on scaffolding on either side of the stage, of course did not exist in the original and the current site rather than the original architecture determines the shape of the auditorium. Twelve hundred seats in slightly offset arcs ascend the original hillside, giving an excellent view of the stage from each seat. The old Chautauqua theatre walls, now ivy-covered, remain as the outer perimeter of the theatre.
The US$7.6 million Paul Allen
Pavilion was added in 1992. It houses a control room, and audience services including infrared hearing devices, blankets, pillows and food and drink, which are allowed in the auditorium. Several hundred seats were moved to a balcony and two box seats, further improving sightlines and acoustics. Vomitoria, the traditional name for entryways for actors from under the seating area, were added and the lighting scaffolds were eliminated.
Each year, three plays are offered in rotation Tuesdays through Sundays in the Elizabethan Theatre from late June to early October.
An April 1968 report by the Bureau of Business and Economic Research of the University of Oregon
pointed to the evidence of thousands of people who were turned away each year, noted that the Oregon Shakespeare Festival had become an important economic engine for southern Oregon
, and recommended addition of an indoor theatre.
The City of Ashland applied to the Economic Development Administration
of the Department of Commerce in Fall 1968 for a US$1,792,000 project grant with the Angus Bowmer Theatre as the keystone. The plan also called for a parking building, a remodeled administration building and box office, a scene shop and exhibit hall that later would become the OSF Black Swan Theatre, landscaping, and street realignment. US$896,000 was approved in April 1969, to match an equal amount to be raised through private donations. The fund drive quickly exceeded its goal and ground for the new theatre was broken on December 18, 1969. The building was ready just five months later to open on May 22, 1970 with a production of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, selected to recognize the Shakespearean origin of the Festival but to indicate that it also was ready to broaden its horizons by incorporating modern plays into its repertoire. Reinforcing that message, The Fantasticks
and You Can’t Take it with You were the other two plays presented during that first six-week season. Fulfilling the original plan, it now offers five plays from mid-February till late October each year.
The design, by Kirk, Wallace and McKinley of Seattle, with theater consulting by Landry & Bogan Theatre Consultants, was basic, functional and innovative. All seats are within 55 feet (16.8 m) of the stage, arranged with only two side aisles and wide spaces between rows. Dark colors resist reflection and draw the eye to the stage. The forestage is on a hydraulic lift system that can emulate the thrust stage of the OSF Elizabethan Theatre, form a more conventional proscenium front, move below auditorium floor level to form an orchestra pit, or drop two stories for storage of equipment or scenery. The walls of the auditorium can swing in to close down the playing area or open to accommodate larger productions.
In what the Executive Director called the biggest crisis in the 75-year history of the Festival, a crack was discovered in the seventy-foot long, six and one-half foot high main ceiling support beam of the Bowmer Theatre two hours before the 18 June 2011 matinee. Shows were immediately relocated to other venues as work progressed to repair the beam. A 598 seat tent, "Bowmer in the Park", was erected as a temporary replacement venue. A single set was designed and built to serve four very different shows, and the shows themselves were re-staged while keeping the artistic vision of each as intact as possible. Thirty-one performances were given in the tent and averaged 82% of capacity generating approximately $650,000 in revenue against approximately $800,000 for the tent itself, $1,000,000 in lost revenue from ticket returns, and $330,000 in repair costs to the Bowmer. The Bowmer reopened on 2 August, a month ahead of the initial estimate.
, was bought in 1969 as a second-floor scene shop
and first-floor rehearsal hall. Company members began using it to stage "midnight" readings for one another. They invited friends who brought other friends. Artistic Director Jerry Turner recognized the opportunity to take risks with unconventional staging and subjects, and called for its development as a third OSF theatre.
Fitting a theatre into the existing building was challenging. It could hold only 138 seats, all within five rows of the stage. There had to be, as designer Richard Hay put it, a "certain amount of tucking and squeezing." Each director had to solve the problem of an immovable roof support in the middle of the stage. In one scene, with a horizontal piece added, it became a painting of a crucifixion
.
The Black Swan is now still part of the festival's property but does not officially host plays. The New Theatre was being built while the Black Swan was in use.
In March 2002, the New Theatre replaced the Black Swan, which again became an ancillary building for rehearsals, meetings, and classes. It expands the possibilities for experiment and innovation while maintaining the intimacy of the Black Swan. Thomas Hacker and Associates of Portland designed the building. Richard Hay designed three possible seating and staging modes, working with the theater consulting firm of Landry & Bogan, Inc. of Mountain View, California. In Arena mode, a stage of 663 square feet (61.6 m²) is surrounded on all four sides by 360 seats. In Three-quarter Thrust mode, a 710 square feet (66 m²) stage is surrounded on three sides by 270 seats, and in Avenue mode, a 1236 square feet (114.8 m²) stage provides 228 seats on two sides. There is a trap room under the stage and a fly loft at one end. A computer controls 300 circuits and over 400 lights of various types.
The remainder of the building is given over to downstairs and upstairs lobbies, concessions, access distribution, archives, storage, laundry, green room
, quiet green room, warm-up room, dressing space for 18 actors, showers/restrooms, costume and wig rooms, stage manager
's office, maintenance space, storage for props and set pieces, and trap.
The Festival acquired the Administration Building (G) in April 1967. Forming the northern boundary of the campus, the building houses the Group Sales Office (H), artistic, business, communication, education, human resources, marketing, and volunteer offices, the scenic design studio, and the mailroom. The Festival Welcome Center (I), on the northern side of the building facing Main Street, offers information about OSF and Ashland, houses a small exhibit of costumes from past shows, and adjoins the Margery Bailey Room, otherwise known as the Education Center. The adjacent Camps Building (K) houses the membership lounge, development offices, and a meeting room.
Just off the courtyard, the Pioneer Building (L) houses the Festival's costume and costume props shop. The staff of over 60 creates the costumes in three main studios on the lower floor of the building. Also on that floor are offices and fitting rooms for the costume designers and costume design assistants, a costume props area and a vented paint room. Upstairs is a dye room, lounge, laundry, storage room, and office. During the height of the costume production each season, another working studio is open in the basement of the Angus Bowmer Theatre. Costumes from past shows are warehoused off-campus in a 7500 square feet (696.8 m²) facility housing some 15,000 costumes and 10-15,000 costume props such as armor, boots, crowns, shoes and wigs. Also off-campus is a purpose-equipped fitness center staffed by two professional trainers who help prepare actors for physically demanding roles that often require acrobatics, fights, and pratfalls.
The Festival acquired Carpenter Hall (M) in October 1973, renovating it to accommodate lectures, concerts, rehearsals, meetings and Festival and community events. The Bill Patton Garden (N) provides the venue for informal summer noon talks by OSF staff. The Tudor Guild, a separate non-profit corporation, operates the Tudor Guild Gift Shop (J) and Brass Rubbing Center (O) where visitors can make rubbings of facsimiles of 55 historic English brasses under expert guidance.
The Executive Director, Paul E. Nicholson, supervises an administrative staff of approximately 125 people. They include human resources (which includes the volunteer and special events coordinator), information technology, marketing and communications (box office, membership, publications, archives, media, members lounge and audience services which itself includes house managers, ushers, concessions, access staff for handicapped patrons), physical plant staff (custodial services, maintenance, security), and receptionists.
Associate producers, voice and text director, resident designers and design assistants, designers, guest directors, composers, choreographers.
At any given moment, the artistic staff of approximately 100 permanent and temporary staff. It is under the direction of an artistic director and includes an associate artistic director, composers, choreographers, dramaturges, designers and design assistants, directors and assistant directors, and voice and text director.
The production staff of approximately 125 is responsible for costumes, lighting, properties, scenery, sound, and stage operations. Costumes are produced by a staff of about 70 (artisans, cutters, designers, dyers, first hands, hair and wig specialists, stitchers, technicians, and wardrobe managers). Scenery is built by a staff of technicians, carpenters, a welder, an engineer and a buyer and moved by a crew of 24 stagehands; lighting staff number eight, and sound and properties each are managed by staffs of six each. A production stage manager, eight stage managers and three production managers ensure the smooth operation of the three theatres and a deck manager coordinates the Green Show.
The education staff of nine includes the director and associate director, education coordinators and assistants, curriculum specialists, and resident teaching artists. Twelve actors participate in the annual School Visit Program and about a dozen company members and guests assist in teaching for the programs described above. In addition, the FAIR manager recruits college and university students from across the United States for internships on the administrative, artistic, education, and production staffs.
with a synopsis of the plays, cast lists, and directors' statements. All members receive Prologue each season. This magazine contains selected articles on directors, actors, costumes, props, and plays each season. Another publication that is made available at higher donor levels is Illuminations, a comprehensive guide to each year's plays that includes synopses, themes, information on playwrights and historical and other contextual information to better understand the plays themselves.
Finally, detailed information on the plays and OSF itself are included in the annual Souvenir Program. It includes photographic highlights of each play and special articles along with pictures and biographies of actors, playwrights, and the many people who work behind the scenes. A chart emphasizing the repertory nature of OSF lists all the actors and their parts in the plays.
, the national service organization for the not-for-profit theatre world, and a member of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America
. It operates under contracts with Actors' Equity Association
, The Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States, and the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, Inc., an independent national labor union.
Repertory
Repertory or rep, also called stock in the United States, is a term used in Western theatre and opera.A repertory theatre can be a theatre in which a resident company presents works from a specified repertoire, usually in alternation or rotation...
in Ashland, Oregon
Ashland, Oregon
Ashland is a city in Jackson County, Oregon, United States, near Interstate 5 and the California border, and located in the south end of the Rogue Valley. It was named after Ashland County, Ohio, point of origin of Abel Helman and other founders, and secondarily for Ashland, Kentucky, where other...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. The festival annually produces eleven plays on three stages during a season that lasts from February to October. Approximately half of the plays produced each year are by William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
.
Overview
A typical season at OSF consists of three plays on the outdoor Elizabethan Stage (aka Allen Pavilion), three in the New Theatre, and five in the Angus Bowmer Theatre. OSF provides a broad range of educational programs for secondary and college students and theatre professionals while providing a wide range of classic and contemporary plays. While OSF has produced non-Shakespearean works since 1960, each season continues to include three to five Shakespeare plays. Since 1935, it has staged Shakespeare's complete canon three times, completing the first cycle in 1958 with a production of Troilus and CressidaTroilus and Cressida
Troilus and Cressida is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1602. It was also described by Frederick S. Boas as one of Shakespeare's problem plays. The play ends on a very bleak note with the death of the noble Trojan Hector and destruction of the love between Troilus...
and completing the second and third cycles through the works in 1978 and 1997. Since 2000, there has also been at least one new work each season from playwrights such as Octavio Solis and Robert Schenkkan
Robert Schenkkan
Robert Frederic Schenkkan, Jr. is an American playwright, screenwriter, and actor, perhaps most recognizable as the character of Lieutenant Commander Dexter Remmick in Star Trek: The Next Generation...
.
In addition to the plays, a free outdoor "Green Show" precedes the evening plays from June through October. Originally, it offered Elizabethan music and dancers. From 1966 till 2007, it consisted of three shows in rotation inspired by the plays showing in the Elizabethan Theatre. Live music was supplied by the Terra Nova Consort and other guest musicians and modern dance was performed by Dance Kaleidoscope, a modern dance group. In 2008, the Green Show was revamped. Performers may include a dance group from Mexico or India, clowns doing ballet on stilts, jugglers, or a fire show. OSF actors might showcase their musical talents. Improv, metal, or rock-n-roll variations on Shakespeare might be seen. Individual performers, groups, choirs, bands, and orchestras may present Afro-Cuban, baroque, blues, classical, contemporary, cowboy, funk, gospel, hip-hop, jazz, mariachi, marimba, poetry, marionette, renaissance, or salsa, sometimes combined in unexpected ways. Performers are drawn from throughout the Northwest and California.
The festival presents 750-800 performances of eleven plays in three theatres from February through October each year, with a total average audience of 375,000 to 400,000. The company consists of about 325 full-time personnel, including over 100 actors, 175 part-time support personnel, and approximately 600 volunteers.
The Oregon Shakespeare Festival is listed as a Major Festival in the book Shakespeare Festivals Around the World.
History
The festival traces its roots to the ChautauquaChautauqua
Chautauqua was an adult education movement in the United States, highly popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chautauqua assemblies expanded and spread throughout rural America until the mid-1920s. The Chautauqua brought entertainment and culture for the whole community, with...
movement of the late 1800s. In 1893, the residents of Ashland built a facility that hosted its first performance on 5 July. The building was expanded in 1905, and in its heyday, accommodated audiences of 1500 for appearances by the likes of John Phillip Sousa and William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan was an American politician in the late-19th and early-20th centuries. He was a dominant force in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, standing three times as its candidate for President of the United States...
during annual 10-day seasons.
In 1917, a new domed structure was built at the site, but it fell into disrepair after the Chautauqua movement died out in the 1920s. In 1935, the similarity of the remaining wall of the by now roofless Chautauqua building to Elizabethan theatres inspired Southern Oregon Normal School
Southern Oregon University
is a public liberal arts college located in Ashland, Oregon, United States. Founded in 1926, it was formerly known as Southern Oregon College and Southern Oregon State College . SOU offers criminology, natural sciences, including environmental science, Shakespearean studies and theatre arts programs...
drama professor Angus L. Bowmer
Angus L. Bowmer
Angus L. Bowmer was the founder of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, United States. During his tenure as artistic director, he produced all 37 of William Shakespeare's plays and performed 32 Shakespearean roles in 43 separate stagings.-Biography:Angus Livingston Bowmer was born...
to propose using it to present plays by Shakespeare. Ashland city leaders granted him a sum "not to exceed US$
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
400" (US$5,600 2005 est.) to present two plays as part of the city's Independence Day
Independence Day (United States)
Independence Day, commonly known as the Fourth of July, is a federal holiday in the United States commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, declaring independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain...
celebration. However, they pressed Bowmer to add boxing matches to cover the expected deficit. Bowmer agreed, feeling such an event was in perfect keeping with the bawdiness of Elizabethan theatre
English Renaissance theatre
English Renaissance theatre, also known as early modern English theatre, refers to the theatre of England, largely based in London, which occurred between the Reformation and the closure of the theatres in 1642...
, and the performances went forward. The Works Progress Administration
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...
helped construct a makeshift Elizabethan stage on the Chautauqua site, and confidently billed as the "First Annual Oregon Shakespearean Festival", Bowmer presented Twelfth Night
Twelfth Night, or What You Will
Twelfth Night; or, What You Will is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written around 1601–02 as a Twelfth Night's entertainment for the close of the Christmas season...
on July 2 and July 4, 1935 and The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...
on July 3, with Bowmer directing and playing the lead roles in both plays. Reserved seats cost US$1, with general admission of US$.50 for adults and US$.25 for children (US$13.80, US$6.90, and US$3.45 2005 est.). Ironically, it was the profit from the plays that covered the losses the boxing matches incurred.
The festival has continued ever since, excepting 1941–46, when Bowmer served in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, and quickly developed a reputation for quality productions. In 1939, OSF took a production of The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1591.The play begins with a framing device, often referred to as the Induction, in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Sly into believing he is actually a nobleman himself...
to the Golden Gate International Exposition
Golden Gate International Exposition
The Golden Gate International Exposition , held at San Francisco, California's Treasure Island, was a World's Fair that celebrated, among other things, the city's two newly-built bridges. The San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge was dedicated in 1936 and the Golden Gate Bridge was dedicated in 1937...
in San Francisco, California
San Francisco, California
San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...
that was nationally broadcast on radio. The lead actress, learning at the last minute the broadcast would be to a national audience, suffered a panic attack, was rushed to the hospital and the stand-in took over. The scripts didn’t arrive on the set until three minutes before air time. The Festival achieved widespread national recognition when, from 1951 to 1973, NBC broadcast abbreviated performances each year that were carried by more than 100 stations and, after 1954 on Armed Forces Radio and Radio Free Europe. The programs won favorable review from critics and for the first time people began to come from around the country. The programs led Life magazine to do a story on the Festival in 1957, bringing even more people to the plays. The NBC programs and the subsequent attention go a long way to explaining the mystery of how a tiny out-of-the-way timber town in the Northwest became a theatrical and tourist Mecca.
A second playhouse, the indoor Angus Bowmer Theatre, opened in 1970, enabling OSF to expand its season into the spring and fall; within a year, attendance tripled to 150,000. Bowmer retired in 1971, and leadership of the festival passed to Jerry Turner, a respected actor/director and later a translator of Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of prose drama" and is one of the founders of Modernism in the theatre...
and August Strindberg
August Strindberg
Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist and painter. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg's career spanned four decades, during which time he wrote over 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography,...
. Turner opened OSF's third theatre, the Black Swan, in 1977, and festival attendance soon reached 300,000. In 1983 OSF won a Tony Award
Tony Award
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...
for achievement in regional theatre. Five years later, the Oregon Shakespearean Festival was renamed the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. At the invitation of the City of Portland
Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...
, from 1988–1994, OSF established a resident theatre in the Portland Center for the Performing Arts
Portland Center for the Performing Arts
The Portland Center for the Performing Arts is an organization within Metro that runs venues for live theatre, concerts, cinema, small conferences, and similar events in Portland, Oregon, United States....
, which later spun off to independence as Portland Center Stage
Portland Center Stage
Portland Center Stage is a theater company based in Portland, Oregon, United States. Theater productions are presented at the Gerding Theater at the Armory in Portland's Pearl District. PCS was founded in 1988 as the northern sibling of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon...
. Those six seasons ran from November-April, and company members often worked in both cities.
Turner retired in 1991 and actor/director Henry Woronicz
Henry Woronicz
Henry Woronicz is an American actor, director, and producer who was formerly the artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival from 1991 to 1995. He was an actor and resident director there starting in 1984...
took control for five seasons. 1992 saw the opening of the Allen Pavilion, which encircled the open-air seating area within the walls of the Elizabethan Theatre.
When Woronicz left in 1996, OSF recruited Libby Appel
Libby Appel
Libby Appel , the fourth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, retired in June 2007. and was succeeded by Cornerstone Theatre Company artistic director, Bill Rauch. Appel directed more than 25 productions at OSF, and her artistic vision influenced the 11 plays presented each year...
from the highly respected Indiana Repertory Theatre
Indiana Repertory Theatre
-History:Indiana Repertory Theatre, frequently abbreviated IRT, is a theatre in Indianapolis, Indiana that began as a genuine repertory theatre with its casts performing in multiple shows at once. It has subsequently become a regional theatre and a member of the League of Resident Theatres...
, and a guest director at OSF from 1988 to 1991, as artistic director. In 1997, the OSF-commissioned The Magic Fire was presented at the John F. Kennedy Center and named by Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
among the year's best plays. In 2001, the ten millionth ticket to an OSF performance was sold. In 2002, the New Theatre replaced the Black Swan as the venue for small, experimental productions in a Black box theatre
Black box theater
The black box theater is a relatively recent innovation, consisting of a simple, somewhat unadorned performance space, usually a large square room with black walls and a flat floor.-History:...
. In 2003, Time named OSF as the second best regional theatre in the United States (Chicago's Goodman Theater was first).
Appel was succeeded in 2008 as Artistic Director by Bill Rauch
Bill Rauch
Bill Rauch is an American artistic director. Rauch succeeded Libby Appel as the fifth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in June 2007...
. Rauch was the artistic director and co-founder of the Cornerstone Theater Company
Cornerstone Theater Company
Cornerstone Theater Company is a theater company based in the United States that specializes in community-based collaboration. According to the mission statement published on the company's website, "Cornerstone Theater Company is a multi-ethnic, ensemble-based theater company...
in Los Angeles and had directed plays previously at OSF. He is making direct connections between classic plays and contemporary concerns, exploring beyond the Western canon
Western canon
The term Western canon denotes a canon of books and, more broadly, music and art that have been the most important and influential in shaping Western culture. As such, it includes the "greatest works of artistic merit." Such a canon is important to the theory of educational perennialism and the...
to incorporate Asian and African epics into the Festival, and reaching out to youth. Inspired by Shakespeare's history plays, he has initiated a series of original plays focusing on American history. While continuing to work with established playwrights, he has commissioned works by new ones, and has initiated the Black Swan Lab to develop new works for the stage. His work resulted in his receiving the Margo Jones Award recognizing his impact on American theatre in 2009.
A $400,000 grant from the Collins Foundation has enabled OSF to initiate a ten-year plan to create a series of up to thirty-seven original plays in American Revolutions: the United States History Cycle under the supervision of OSF Associate Director Allison Carey. Thirty-seven plays, matching the total number of plays Shakespeare wrote, aims at understanding our national identity. American Night, by Richard Montoya, Ric Salinas, and Herbert Siguenza of Culture Clash
Culture Clash
Culture Clash may refer to:* Culture Clash , American performance troupe* Culture Clash , British band which plays Harare Jit music...
, the first play in the series, was presented as part of the 2010 season, and proved so popular that for the first time in OSF history, was expanded to include extra performances. Ghost Light, by Jonathan Moscone of California Shakespeare Theater
California Shakespeare Theater
California Shakespeare Theater is a regional theater located in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. Its performance space, the Lt. G.H...
and Tony Taccone
Tony Taccone
Tony Taccone is an American theater director, and currently the artistic director of Berkeley Repertory Theatre in Berkeley, California.-Early life:...
of Berkeley Repertory Theatre
Berkeley Repertory Theatre
Berkeley Repertory Theatre is a regional theater company located in Berkeley, California. It was founded in 1968, as the East Bay’s first resident professional theatre. Michael Leibert was the founding artistic director, who was then succeeded by Sharon Ott in 1984. The company runs seven...
, the second in the series, was presented as part of the 2011 series. Five additional plays have been contracted with the following playwrights:
1988 Tony Award
Tony Award
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...
winner David Henry Hwang
David Henry Hwang
David Henry Hwang is an American playwright who has risen to prominence as the preeminent Asian American dramatist in the U.S.He was born in Los Angeles, California and was educated at the Yale School of Drama and Stanford University...
Guggenheim and 2007 MacArthur Fellow Lynn Nottage
Lynn Nottage
Lynn Nottage is an American playwright whose work often deals with the lives of women of African descent, African Americans and women. She was born in Brooklyn and is a graduate of Brown University and the Yale School of Drama. She received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005, and a MacArthur Genius...
2002 Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
winner Robert Schenkkan
Robert Schenkkan
Robert Frederic Schenkkan, Jr. is an American playwright, screenwriter, and actor, perhaps most recognizable as the character of Lieutenant Commander Dexter Remmick in Star Trek: The Next Generation...
1999 MacArthur Fellow Naomi Wallace
Naomi Wallace
Naomi Wallace is a playwright, screenwriter and poet from Prospect, Kentucky, United States.-Life:Wallace obtained her Bachelor of Arts from Hampshire College and did graduate studies at the University of Iowa....
2001 MacArthur Fellow and 2002 Pulitzer Prize winner Suzan-Lori Parks
Suzan-Lori Parks
Suzan-Lori Parks is an African American playwright and screenwriter. She received the MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant in 2001, and the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for her play, Topdog/Underdog.-Early years:...
.
OSF campus
Lithia Park
Lithia Park is the largest and most central park of Ashland, Oregon. It consists of of forested canyonland around Ashland Creek, stretching from the downtown plaza up toward its headwaters near Mount Ashland...
and the Plaza in Ashland, Oregon. The primary buildings are the three theatres, Carpenter Hall, and the Camps, Pioneer, and Administration buildings, all surrounding an open central court, locally known as “The Festival Courtyard." The Festival Courtyard ties the three theatres together into an architectural whole and facilitates movement. It also provides a stage for the nightly Green Shows from June through September. Other facilities include the costume warehouse, costume shop, production and plant shops, classrooms, and rehearsal spaces.
Original Elizabethan Theatre
The Elizabethan Stage has evolved since the founding of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. The design for the first outdoor OSF Elizabethan Theatre was sketched by Angus L. BowmerAngus L. Bowmer
Angus L. Bowmer was the founder of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, United States. During his tenure as artistic director, he produced all 37 of William Shakespeare's plays and performed 32 Shakespearean roles in 43 separate stagings.-Biography:Angus Livingston Bowmer was born...
on the back of an envelope based on his recollection of productions at the University of Washington in which he had acted as a student. Ashland, Oregon
Ashland, Oregon
Ashland is a city in Jackson County, Oregon, United States, near Interstate 5 and the California border, and located in the south end of the Rogue Valley. It was named after Ashland County, Ohio, point of origin of Abel Helman and other founders, and secondarily for Ashland, Kentucky, where other...
obtained WPA funds in 1935 to build it in the roofless shell of the abandoned Chautauqua
Chautauqua
Chautauqua was an adult education movement in the United States, highly popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chautauqua assemblies expanded and spread throughout rural America until the mid-1920s. The Chautauqua brought entertainment and culture for the whole community, with...
theatre, the 12 feet (3.7 m) circular walls which remained after the dome had been removed. Bowmer extended the walls to reduce the stage width to fifty-five feet, and painted the extensions to resemble half-timbered buildings. He designed a thrust stage—one projecting toward the audience—with a balcony. Two columns helped divide the main stage into forestage, middle stage, and inner stage areas. Fifty cent general admission seating was on benches just behind the one dollar reserved seating on folding chairs. This theatre was torn down during World War II.
Second Elizabethan Theatre
The second outdoor Elizabethan Theatre was built in 1947 from plans drawn up by University of WashingtonUniversity of Washington
University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...
drama professor John Conway. The main stage became trapezoidal, with entries added on either side, and windows added above them flanking the balcony stage. A low railing gave a finished appearance to the forestage. Chairs arranged to improve sight lines replaced bench seating. Backstage areas were added gradually and haphazardly, until the ramshackle result was ordered torn down as a fire hazard in 1958.
Current Eizabethan Theatre
Fortune Playhouse
The Fortune Playhouse was an historic theatre in London. It was located between Whitecross Street and the modern Golden Lane, just outside the City of London...
. Designed by Richard Hay
Richard L. Hay (scenic designer)
Richard L. Hay is the Principal Theatre and Scenic Director at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.-Career:Richard L. Hay has since 1950 been Actor, Lighting Assistant, Technical Director, Art Director, Designer and Technical Director, Resident Scenic Designer, and Principal Theatre and Scenic...
, it incorporated all the stage dimensions mentioned in the Fortune contract. The trapezoidal stage was retained but the façade was extended to three stories, resulting in a forestage, middle stage, inner below, inner above (the old balcony), and a musicians' gallery. The wings were provided with second-story windows. Each provides acting areas, creating many staging possibilities. A pitched, shingled roof enhances the half-timbered façade. A windowed gable was extended from the center of the roof to cover and define the middle stage. Just before each performance, an actor opens the gable window, and in keeping with Elizabethan tradition signaling a play in progress, runs a flag up the pole to the sound of a trumpet and doffs his cap to the audience.
The result is not an exact replica of the Fortune Theatre. The known but incomplete dimensions apply only to the stage. The original specifications sometimes say no more than "to be built like the Globe," for which there are no plans or details. The remotely operated lighting, on scaffolding on either side of the stage, of course did not exist in the original and the current site rather than the original architecture determines the shape of the auditorium. Twelve hundred seats in slightly offset arcs ascend the original hillside, giving an excellent view of the stage from each seat. The old Chautauqua theatre walls, now ivy-covered, remain as the outer perimeter of the theatre.
The US$7.6 million Paul Allen
Paul Allen
Paul Gardner Allen is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. Allen co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates...
Pavilion was added in 1992. It houses a control room, and audience services including infrared hearing devices, blankets, pillows and food and drink, which are allowed in the auditorium. Several hundred seats were moved to a balcony and two box seats, further improving sightlines and acoustics. Vomitoria, the traditional name for entryways for actors from under the seating area, were added and the lighting scaffolds were eliminated.
Each year, three plays are offered in rotation Tuesdays through Sundays in the Elizabethan Theatre from late June to early October.
Angus Bowmer Theatre
The 600-or-more-seat indoor Angus Bowmer Theatre of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival opened in 1970. It increased audience capacity by over 100 percent by making it possible to hold matinee performances and to extend the season into spring and fall.An April 1968 report by the Bureau of Business and Economic Research of the University of Oregon
University of Oregon
-Colleges and schools:The University of Oregon is organized into eight schools and colleges—six professional schools and colleges, an Arts and Sciences College and an Honors College.- School of Architecture and Allied Arts :...
pointed to the evidence of thousands of people who were turned away each year, noted that the Oregon Shakespeare Festival had become an important economic engine for southern Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
, and recommended addition of an indoor theatre.
The City of Ashland applied to the Economic Development Administration
Economic Development Administration
The Economic Development Administration is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that provides grants to economically distressed communities to generate new employment, help retain existing jobs and stimulate industrial and commercial growth.-History:The EDA was established under...
of the Department of Commerce in Fall 1968 for a US$1,792,000 project grant with the Angus Bowmer Theatre as the keystone. The plan also called for a parking building, a remodeled administration building and box office, a scene shop and exhibit hall that later would become the OSF Black Swan Theatre, landscaping, and street realignment. US$896,000 was approved in April 1969, to match an equal amount to be raised through private donations. The fund drive quickly exceeded its goal and ground for the new theatre was broken on December 18, 1969. The building was ready just five months later to open on May 22, 1970 with a production of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, selected to recognize the Shakespearean origin of the Festival but to indicate that it also was ready to broaden its horizons by incorporating modern plays into its repertoire. Reinforcing that message, The Fantasticks
The Fantasticks
The Fantasticks is a 1960 musical with music by Harvey Schmidt and lyrics by Tom Jones. It was produced by Lore Noto. It tells an allegorical story, loosely based on the play "The Romancers" by Edmond Rostand, concerning two neighboring fathers who trick their children, Luisa and Matt, into...
and You Can’t Take it with You were the other two plays presented during that first six-week season. Fulfilling the original plan, it now offers five plays from mid-February till late October each year.
The design, by Kirk, Wallace and McKinley of Seattle, with theater consulting by Landry & Bogan Theatre Consultants, was basic, functional and innovative. All seats are within 55 feet (16.8 m) of the stage, arranged with only two side aisles and wide spaces between rows. Dark colors resist reflection and draw the eye to the stage. The forestage is on a hydraulic lift system that can emulate the thrust stage of the OSF Elizabethan Theatre, form a more conventional proscenium front, move below auditorium floor level to form an orchestra pit, or drop two stories for storage of equipment or scenery. The walls of the auditorium can swing in to close down the playing area or open to accommodate larger productions.
In what the Executive Director called the biggest crisis in the 75-year history of the Festival, a crack was discovered in the seventy-foot long, six and one-half foot high main ceiling support beam of the Bowmer Theatre two hours before the 18 June 2011 matinee. Shows were immediately relocated to other venues as work progressed to repair the beam. A 598 seat tent, "Bowmer in the Park", was erected as a temporary replacement venue. A single set was designed and built to serve four very different shows, and the shows themselves were re-staged while keeping the artistic vision of each as intact as possible. Thirty-one performances were given in the tent and averaged 82% of capacity generating approximately $650,000 in revenue against approximately $800,000 for the tent itself, $1,000,000 in lost revenue from ticket returns, and $330,000 in repair costs to the Bowmer. The Bowmer reopened on 2 August, a month ahead of the initial estimate.
Black Swan Theatre
The Black Swan served as the festival's third theatre from 1977 to 2001. The building, originally an automobile dealershipCar dealership
A car dealership or vehicle local distribution is a business that sells new or used cars at the retail level, based on a dealership contract with an automaker or its sales subsidiary. It employs automobile salespeople to do the selling...
, was bought in 1969 as a second-floor scene shop
Scene shop
A scenery shop or scene shop is a specialized workshop found in many medium or large theaters, as well as many educational theatre settings. The primary function of a scene shop is to fabricate and assemble the flats, platforms, scenery wagons, and other scenic pieces required for a performance...
and first-floor rehearsal hall. Company members began using it to stage "midnight" readings for one another. They invited friends who brought other friends. Artistic Director Jerry Turner recognized the opportunity to take risks with unconventional staging and subjects, and called for its development as a third OSF theatre.
Fitting a theatre into the existing building was challenging. It could hold only 138 seats, all within five rows of the stage. There had to be, as designer Richard Hay put it, a "certain amount of tucking and squeezing." Each director had to solve the problem of an immovable roof support in the middle of the stage. In one scene, with a horizontal piece added, it became a painting of a crucifixion
Crucifixion
Crucifixion is an ancient method of painful execution in which the condemned person is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross and left to hang until dead...
.
The Black Swan is now still part of the festival's property but does not officially host plays. The New Theatre was being built while the Black Swan was in use.
New Theatre
The remainder of the building is given over to downstairs and upstairs lobbies, concessions, access distribution, archives, storage, laundry, green room
Green room
In British English and American English show business lexicon, the green room is that space in a theatre, a studio, or a similar venue, which accommodates performers or speakers not yet required on stage...
, quiet green room, warm-up room, dressing space for 18 actors, showers/restrooms, costume and wig rooms, stage manager
Stage management
Stage management is the practice of organizing and coordinating a theatrical production. It encompasses a variety of activities, including organizing the production and coordinating communications between various personnel...
's office, maintenance space, storage for props and set pieces, and trap.
Other buildings
The Box Office (P) is on the same courtyard as the New Theatre.The Festival acquired the Administration Building (G) in April 1967. Forming the northern boundary of the campus, the building houses the Group Sales Office (H), artistic, business, communication, education, human resources, marketing, and volunteer offices, the scenic design studio, and the mailroom. The Festival Welcome Center (I), on the northern side of the building facing Main Street, offers information about OSF and Ashland, houses a small exhibit of costumes from past shows, and adjoins the Margery Bailey Room, otherwise known as the Education Center. The adjacent Camps Building (K) houses the membership lounge, development offices, and a meeting room.
Just off the courtyard, the Pioneer Building (L) houses the Festival's costume and costume props shop. The staff of over 60 creates the costumes in three main studios on the lower floor of the building. Also on that floor are offices and fitting rooms for the costume designers and costume design assistants, a costume props area and a vented paint room. Upstairs is a dye room, lounge, laundry, storage room, and office. During the height of the costume production each season, another working studio is open in the basement of the Angus Bowmer Theatre. Costumes from past shows are warehoused off-campus in a 7500 square feet (696.8 m²) facility housing some 15,000 costumes and 10-15,000 costume props such as armor, boots, crowns, shoes and wigs. Also off-campus is a purpose-equipped fitness center staffed by two professional trainers who help prepare actors for physically demanding roles that often require acrobatics, fights, and pratfalls.
The Festival acquired Carpenter Hall (M) in October 1973, renovating it to accommodate lectures, concerts, rehearsals, meetings and Festival and community events. The Bill Patton Garden (N) provides the venue for informal summer noon talks by OSF staff. The Tudor Guild, a separate non-profit corporation, operates the Tudor Guild Gift Shop (J) and Brass Rubbing Center (O) where visitors can make rubbings of facsimiles of 55 historic English brasses under expert guidance.
Organization
OSF is a non-profit corporation managed under US and Oregon law by a 32-member Board of Directors nominated and elected for eight-year terms. OSF is supported in part by corporate and individual donors through annual non-voting memberships at various levels, planned giving, or direct support of specific plays. In 2006, the endowment had a net worth in excess of US$30 million that returns about US$1.2 million to support the operating budget of about US$24 million per year. It is managed by seven trustees who are selected for five-year terms by the Board of Directors.Professional staff
Apart from approximately 90 actors and 25 musicians and dancers, OSF is organized into administrative, artistic, education, music and dance, and production staffs.The Executive Director, Paul E. Nicholson, supervises an administrative staff of approximately 125 people. They include human resources (which includes the volunteer and special events coordinator), information technology, marketing and communications (box office, membership, publications, archives, media, members lounge and audience services which itself includes house managers, ushers, concessions, access staff for handicapped patrons), physical plant staff (custodial services, maintenance, security), and receptionists.
Associate producers, voice and text director, resident designers and design assistants, designers, guest directors, composers, choreographers.
At any given moment, the artistic staff of approximately 100 permanent and temporary staff. It is under the direction of an artistic director and includes an associate artistic director, composers, choreographers, dramaturges, designers and design assistants, directors and assistant directors, and voice and text director.
The production staff of approximately 125 is responsible for costumes, lighting, properties, scenery, sound, and stage operations. Costumes are produced by a staff of about 70 (artisans, cutters, designers, dyers, first hands, hair and wig specialists, stitchers, technicians, and wardrobe managers). Scenery is built by a staff of technicians, carpenters, a welder, an engineer and a buyer and moved by a crew of 24 stagehands; lighting staff number eight, and sound and properties each are managed by staffs of six each. A production stage manager, eight stage managers and three production managers ensure the smooth operation of the three theatres and a deck manager coordinates the Green Show.
The education staff of nine includes the director and associate director, education coordinators and assistants, curriculum specialists, and resident teaching artists. Twelve actors participate in the annual School Visit Program and about a dozen company members and guests assist in teaching for the programs described above. In addition, the FAIR manager recruits college and university students from across the United States for internships on the administrative, artistic, education, and production staffs.
Access Department
The Access Department offers a full range of programs and services for patrons with disabilities. For blind and visually impaired patrons, the Festival has six trained audio describers on staff who provide live audio description for every performance of every play with two weeks advance notice. Braille and large print playbills are available for all productions. Service animals are always welcome. For deaf and hearing-impaired patrons, six American Sign Language interpreted performances with highly trained interpreters six open captioned performances are offered each season. Complimentary infrared listening devices and telecoil hearing aid loops are available in all three of the Festival’s theatres, and patrons may communicate with the Festival through the Oregon Telecommunications Relay Service. There is accessible seating in all performance venues, nearby accessible parking, and all of the above accommodations can be provided for such ancillary events as backstage tours, prefaces, prologues, and park talks.Artistic directors
- Angus L. BowmerAngus L. BowmerAngus L. Bowmer was the founder of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, United States. During his tenure as artistic director, he produced all 37 of William Shakespeare's plays and performed 32 Shakespearean roles in 43 separate stagings.-Biography:Angus Livingston Bowmer was born...
(1935–1971) - Jerry Turner (1971–1991)
- Henry WoroniczHenry WoroniczHenry Woronicz is an American actor, director, and producer who was formerly the artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival from 1991 to 1995. He was an actor and resident director there starting in 1984...
(1991–1996) - Libby AppelLibby AppelLibby Appel , the fourth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, retired in June 2007. and was succeeded by Cornerstone Theatre Company artistic director, Bill Rauch. Appel directed more than 25 productions at OSF, and her artistic vision influenced the 11 plays presented each year...
(1996–2007) - Bill RauchBill RauchBill Rauch is an American artistic director. Rauch succeeded Libby Appel as the fifth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in June 2007...
(2008–present)
Publications
All playgoers receive a PlaybillProgramme (booklet)
A programme or program is a booklet available for patrons attending a live event such as theatre performances, fêtes, sports events, etc. It is a printed leaflet outlining the parts of the event scheduled to take place, principal performers and background information. In the case of theatrical...
with a synopsis of the plays, cast lists, and directors' statements. All members receive Prologue each season. This magazine contains selected articles on directors, actors, costumes, props, and plays each season. Another publication that is made available at higher donor levels is Illuminations, a comprehensive guide to each year's plays that includes synopses, themes, information on playwrights and historical and other contextual information to better understand the plays themselves.
Finally, detailed information on the plays and OSF itself are included in the annual Souvenir Program. It includes photographic highlights of each play and special articles along with pictures and biographies of actors, playwrights, and the many people who work behind the scenes. A chart emphasizing the repertory nature of OSF lists all the actors and their parts in the plays.
Professional memberships
OSF is a constituent of Theatre Communications GroupTheatre Communications Group
Theatre Communications Group is an organization dedicated to the promotion of non-profit professional theatre in the United States. TCG has over 450 member theatres located in 47 states; 17,000 individual members; and a growing number of University, Funder, Business and Trustee Affiliates...
, the national service organization for the not-for-profit theatre world, and a member of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America
Shakespeare Theatre Association of America
The Shakespeare Theatre Association of America was established to provide a forum for the artistic and managerial leadership of theatres whose central activity is the production of Shakespeare's plays; to discuss issues and share methods of work, resources, and information; and to act as an...
. It operates under contracts with Actors' Equity Association
Actors' Equity Association
The Actors' Equity Association , commonly referred to as Actors' Equity or simply Equity, is an American labor union representing the world of live theatrical performance, as opposed to film and television performance. However, performers appearing on live stage productions without a book or...
, The Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States, and the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, Inc., an independent national labor union.
Productions
2011 season
- Measure for MeasureMeasure for MeasureMeasure for Measure is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604. It was classified as comedy, but its mood defies those expectations. As a result and for a variety of reasons, some critics have labelled it as one of Shakespeare's problem plays...
- by William Shakespeare - The Imaginary Invalid - by MoliereMolièreJean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...
, adapted by Tracy Young and Oded Gross - To Kill a MockingbirdTo Kill a MockingbirdTo Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was instantly successful, winning the Pulitzer Prize, and has become a classic of modern American literature...
- by Harper LeeHarper LeeNelle Harper Lee is an American author known for her 1960 Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird, which deals with the issues of racism that were observed by the author as a child in her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama...
, adapted by Christopher Sergel - Love's Labor's Lost - by William Shakespeare
- August: Osage CountyAugust: Osage CountyAugust: Osage County is a darkly comedic play by Tracy Letts. It was the recipient of the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The play premiered at the Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago on 28 June 2007, and closed on 26 August 2007. Its Broadway debut was at the Imperial Theater on 4 December 2007 and...
- by Tracy LettsTracy LettsTracy Letts is an American playwright and actor who received the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play August: Osage County.-Biography:... - The African Company Presents Richard III - by Carlyle Brown
- The Language Archive - by Julia ChoJulia ChoJulia Cho is an American playwright and television writer who has won national awards for her work.-Biographical information:Cho was born in Los Angeles and is the daughter of Korean immigrants. Her mother is a nurse and her father worked for an aerospace company where his job relocation led the...
- Julius CaesarJulius Caesar (play)The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, also known simply as Julius Caesar, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1599. It portrays the 44 BC conspiracy against...
- by William Shakespeare - Ghost Light - by Tony TacconeTony TacconeTony Taccone is an American theater director, and currently the artistic director of Berkeley Repertory Theatre in Berkeley, California.-Early life:...
and Jonathan Moscone - Henry IV, Part Two - by William Shakespeare
- The Pirates of PenzanceThe Pirates of PenzanceThe Pirates of Penzance; or, The Slave of Duty is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. The opera's official premiere was at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City on 31 December 1879, where the show was well received by both audiences...
- by Arthur SullivanArthur SullivanSir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
and W.S. Gilbert
2012 season
- Romeo and JulietRomeo and JulietRomeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...
- by William Shakespeare - Party PeopleParty People"Party People" may refer to:*"Party People" , a 1979 song by Parliament*"Party People" , a 2008 song by Nelly featuring Fergie.*"Party People", a 2010 song by rock band, N.E.R.D....
- by Universes, a national/international ensemble of multi-disciplined writers and performers who fuse poetry, theater, jazz, hip-hop and politics. - All the Way - by Robert SchenkkanRobert SchenkkanRobert Frederic Schenkkan, Jr. is an American playwright, screenwriter, and actor, perhaps most recognizable as the character of Lieutenant Commander Dexter Remmick in Star Trek: The Next Generation...
- The White SnakeThe White SnakeThe White Snake is a German fairy tale included in the complete volume of the Brothers Grimm, tale number 17. It is Aarne-Thompson type 673.-Synopsis:...
- adapted and directed by Mary ZimmermanMary ZimmermanMary Zimmerman is an American theatre director and playwright, born in Lincoln, Nebraska.-Career:Zimmerman is a member of the Lookingglass Theatre Company and is an Artistic Associate of the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, Illinois. She received her BS, MA and PhD from Northwestern University, where... - The SeagullThe SeagullThe Seagull is the first of what are generally considered to be the four major plays by the Russian dramatist Anton Chekhov. The Seagull was written in 1895 and first produced in 1896...
- by Anton ChekhovAnton ChekhovAnton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian physician, dramatist and author who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short stories in history. His career as a dramatist produced four classics and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics...
, adapted and directed by Libby AppelLibby AppelLibby Appel , the fourth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, retired in June 2007. and was succeeded by Cornerstone Theatre Company artistic director, Bill Rauch. Appel directed more than 25 productions at OSF, and her artistic vision influenced the 11 plays presented each year... - Animal Crackers - music and lyrics by Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby, book by George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind.
- Troilus and CressidaTroilus and CressidaTroilus and Cressida is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1602. It was also described by Frederick S. Boas as one of Shakespeare's problem plays. The play ends on a very bleak note with the death of the noble Trojan Hector and destruction of the love between Troilus...
- by William Shakespeare - Henry VHenry V (play)Henry V is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to be written in approximately 1599. Its full titles are The Cronicle History of Henry the Fifth and The Life of Henry the Fifth...
- by William Shakespeare - As You Like ItAs You Like ItAs You Like It is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 or early 1600 and first published in the folio of 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has been suggested as a possibility...
- by William Shakespeare - The Merry Wives of Windsor, Iowa - by Allison Carey
- Medea/Macbeth/Cinderella - co-adapted and co-directed by Bill RauchBill RauchBill Rauch is an American artistic director. Rauch succeeded Libby Appel as the fifth artistic director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in June 2007...
and Tracy Young
External links
- Oregon Shakespeare Festival (official website)