OCR Text |
Show ' I'KE-IMY ACTIVITIES. Held nightly in conjunction with the Utah Shakesperean Festival is re-play activities including singing, dancing and music. It is all a part of the atmosphere of this 16th annual production of the nationally acclaimed Festival. Festival: training ground Founded in the summer of 1962. the Utah Shakespearean Festival this year presents its 16th consecutive season of Shakespearean plays, and is adding a new dimension with the introduction of Tuesday and Saturday matinees. In this 16th season, signs of growth are everywhere evident: a talented company of actors drawn from colleges and universities across the nation, an experienced and concerned production staff, and record-breaking audiences enjoying1 an authentic Shakespearean theatre, which is this year completed. But growth alone is not the goal of the Utah Shakespearean Festival. From its inception, the Festival has served the dual function of presenting living Shakespeare and of providing a training ground for the young actors and actresses of America. Thus the plays are for both the audience and the players, for both entertainment and instructions. In this regard the Utah Shakespearean Festival is unique: it provides an ensemble repertory company ex perience for young actors. There are no stars, no prima donnas, and the young actor who plays a lead one night may well be carrying a spear the next. For the audiences attending the Festival this is an exciting experience, for it allows them to see young actors and actresses stretch their talents to cover a wide variety of roles on successive nights. This in itself makis the play doubly exciting, an excitement which is heightened by the pre-play entertainment featuring Elizabethan madrigal singers, dancers, and musicians on the green. By the use of a replica Elizabethan stage, Elizabethan staging methods, and rich and colorful costumes of the period, the Utah Shakespearean Festival attempts to suggest the atmosphere in which these thrilling plays were first presented. Finally, however, this is Shakespeare for today great plays brought to life to enrich the lives of modern man. |