The Regions - Oregon Shakespeare Festival

The Regions

We return to our series of visits to the web sites of major regional theatres. This week:

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival

Who would have thought that an Upper New York State summer training program for Sunday school teachers would result in the foundation of one of America's foremost Shakespearean theatre companies? When the original Chautauqua program expanded to become more of a form of adult education, offering lectures by authors, musicians, and world scholars on the arts, sciences, and humanities, the concept spread across the country and several hundred local "Chautauquas" were formed. The Ashland, Oregon branch built a large structure in 1893, which was expanded in 1905 to seat 1,500. Later the building was rebuilt, this time with a large dome. In the 1930's a schoolteacher named Angus L. Bowmer was taken by the fact that the building resembled the Globe Theatre of Shakespeare's day, and he suggested that a series of plays be given in the space. In 1935, as part of Ashland's July 4th celebrations, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival gave performances of its first two Shakespearean plays. In the years since, they have produced the entire Shakespearean canon twice. Angus continued to oversee the running of the theatre until 1971. The facilities are now comprised of three theatres: an outdoor space, the Elizabethan Stage (1,188 seats); the Angus Bowmer Theatre (601 seats), and the intimate Black Swan (138 seats).

Their season is comprised of 11 plays (five Shakespearean and six others), runs from mid-February through October. Once a show opens it continues to play in rep for the rest of the season. The current season includes Othello, The Good Person of Szechuan, Seven Guitars, Pericles, Much Ado About Nothing, Henry IV - Part II, The Three Musketeers, and Tongue of a Bird. Their 2000 season will include (of course, subject to change) Henry V, The Night of the Iguana, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Hamlet, Twelfth Night, Stop Kiss, and Wit.

The site offers some unique, but ultimately confusing features. There are three different calendar views, although none of them isolate the playing dates of a particular show -- you only get to see what's playing on any given day. There are also some truly and unnecessarily massive images that take forever to load: for example, the "Tickets" section of the site contains a 413 kilobyte animated GIF, with the logos for each show of the current season skittling around. On a positive note, each section of the site (e.g., Tickets) is set up in utilizing frames, so that the left hand frame contains links to all the pertinent information (e.g., Sales Schedule, Prices, and Seating Plans -- even the "Understudy

Go To Page: 1 2