Best Season Ever at OSF!
Anthony Heald as Shylock Photo: OSF
I recently returned from my second trip this season at Oregon Shakespeare Festival. This is the 75th anniversary season and the productions have never been better. I raved for months about the stellar Hamlet this spring. If you haven’t heard or seen the slideshow version of my NPR piece, check it out.
I finally got to go back and see Merchant of Venice, Ruined and Throne of Blood. None of those plays disappointed.
Merchant of Venice directed by Artistic Director Bill Rauch and starring Anthony Heald as Shylock is a magnificent indictment on the damage of prejudice.
Tina Packer’s wonderful production “Women of Will”
Director, Actor and Scholar Tina Packer, former Artistic Director of “Shakespeare and Company” in Lenox, MA has written and is performing a new production entitled “Women of Will”. Fabulous!
Tina Packer and Nigel Gore
The work looks at the way Shakespeare wrote his women characters, and how that writing evolved over his 20-year career as a writer.
It is all done with two actors only – Tina and a terrific scene partner named Nigel Gore. They perform scenes, then talk about them, and then move on to the next.
Her piece is fascinating and beautifully organized. Her main premise is that Shakespeare’s view of women evolved over the course of career, starting out writing ‘about’ women, and then, starting with Juliet, writing from ‘inside’ women’s point of view – with deeper understanding of that point of view and creating much deeper, 3 dimensional characters.
Win Free Downloads of Two Peabody-Award-winning music docs!
Announcing the launch of our new site!
We’ll be adding more and more content as we produce the radio series for 2011 and raise funds for the TV series.
As a special promotion we’re offering a way to win free downloads of Steve Rowland’s Peabody-award-winning music documentaries: the 11-hour Leonard Bernstein & the 8-hour Miles Davis Project.
Shakespeare Is — June 3
The site is coming along. The project is coming along. It is all very exciting. We are sitting today in beautiful Portland, OR, and web master Clark Salisbury is training Steve, Dmae and Tali in the intricacies of the site. Dmae and Steve are planning to write regularly, or at least semi-regularly about the project, here in “What’s New”.
Shake Hands with Shakespeare – 6th Grade at University Prep
Shake Hands with Shakespeare
Last week, I was invited by veteran 6th grade teacher Sue Patella to record the development of her annual event: “Shake Hands with Shakespeare”.
Sue works with 60 11 year olds. She divides them up into about 10 groups, each one doing a scene. The sword fight at the end of Macbeth, Petruchio’s first meeting with Kate from Taming of the Shrew, the wall scene from Midsummer Night’s Dream, and yes even the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. The children memorize their lines, go into rehearsal, and perform for the school and parents - all in 3 weeks.
