Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalAugust: Osage County by Tracy Letts We saw the evening performance of August: Osage County the same day as the matinée of Ghost Light.  With apologizes to the Pulitzer jury and to our many friends who felt that August had the best of all possible characterizations and story, in my opinion August is just too contrived and suffers in comparison to the realness of Ghost Light. The Oregon Shakespeare Festival August production is excellent, and none of my reservations come from the Ashland concepts, designs, or acting.  Director Christopher Liam Moore worked a quality, [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalThe Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert and Sullivan What a silly, talented romp!  I cannot imagine a better production of this classic piece of fluff. The Oregon Shakespeare Festival delivers 200% of the music and action of the show. The production is physically dazzling, inventive, and big.  The voices, especially those of Eddie Lopez (Frederic), Michael Elich (the Pirate King), David Kelly (Major-General Stanley), Robin Goodrin Nordli (Ruth), Robert Vincent Frank (Samuel), and Khori Dastoor (Mable) are socks-knocking-off powerful, expressive, and entertaining.  And, yeah, I said "especially" and then named more than a handful [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalWillful Two days later Willful is still coming up in meal conversations and rides in the car. We're still sharing insights of what we experienced and delighting over twists and conceits that worked for us.  Or, maybe that one didn't even exist except in our own mind. More about the Performance

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalHenry IV, Part II by William Shakespeare The consistently inept directing of Shakespeare at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival is inexcusable.  Artistic Director Bill Rauch is brilliant in his own handling of Shakespeare and is visionary about many, many aspects of the festival.  But, his chronic hiring of weak, inexperienced directors for Shakespeare is pissing me off. The outdoor theater looked less than half full when we saw Henry.  Get a clue, Bill.  This mishmash lump of time-consuming theater is not worthy of OSF, most colleges, and many high schools.  The acting company was very [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalThe Language Archive by Julia Cho I saw the opening performance of The Language Archive in February and suffered much embarrassment on our drive up to Ashland for our annual Memorial Day visit as I was asked about the play.  Even when I was prompted with a listing of the title, cast, and writer, I could not remember a thing about the story itself. It took me many, many minutes to recapture the inability of linguist George (Rex Young) to communicate with those who mattered to him, first his wife Kate Mulligan (Mary) and [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalImaginary Invalid written by Moliere adapted by Oded Gross and Tracy Young Nothing is more pointless than dragging a 450-year-old social satire on to the stage with the original words, digs, and references in tact.  I was not looking forward to a dusty homage to Moliere, but my expectations were low anyway because Imaginary Invalid was the designated -- and mandatory -- silly farce for 2011. Fortunately, Oregon Shakespeare Festival choose to be faithful to the spirit of Moliere instead of being slavishly bound to the original text.  This Invalid is all about the [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalJulius Caesar by William Shakespeare All the best moments of this production of Julius Caesar come before Shakespeare's words are heard on stage: The banners in front of the New Theater venue and in its lobbies memorialize assassinated leaders from Xerxes in ancient Persia through Indira Gandhi in modern India. Stark and powerful, these black and white statements promise an accessible, strong, and contemporary evening. Before going dark, Vilma Silva (Caesar -- no problems for me with this gender twist) introduces herself and asks that the audience participate in the play by cheering for [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalMeasure for Measure by William Shakespeare Shakespeare never tired having his lead characters dress up in disguises and hinging plot lines on the fallout of mistaken identity or secret observations.  I, on the other hand, am weary of boys dressed as girls dressed as boys and kings posing as commoners acting kingly.  Too silly.  It doesn't help my enjoyment that most of these stories are comedies with deus ex machina happy endings. Measure for Measure may be officially a "problem play" and not a comedy, but there are enough absurd happy touches for me to decide [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalCat on a Hot Tin Roof written by Tennessee Williams Oregon Shakespeare Festival at its best strips Classic Plays of their Greatness, and allows the actors on stage to tell a simple story unburdened by the responsibility to live up to the Reputation of the Work of Art.  Their 2010 production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof  — which closes too early on July 4 — is an example of OSF at the top of its craft. Director Christopher Moore has blended the original 1955 script with some of the 1974 revisions penned by [...]

Ashland, Oregon at the Oregon Shakespeare FestivalRuined written by Lynn Nottage This horror story opens with the audience being dropped into the middle of the ongoing uncivil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  Mama Nadi (Kimberly Scott) is the wheeling, dealing savior madame and bar owner who, in the opening scene, is convinced by a trader to take on two new girls.  There are 10 girls who work for Mama (only three appear as characters). All have been victims of political gang rape by soldiers who know that their physical victims will then be cast out of their families [...]