This summer marks the 36th season for the Lake Tahoe Shakespeare festival. But it many ways it’s a new beginning. Before this year, the festival imported productions from other companies. Now, in an effort to become a nationally recognized theatre, the festival has hired a new artistic director and an in-house production team. With this new team in place, the festival will stage original productions of “Richard III” and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” along with “CAMBIO”, an original musical love story based on Victor Hugo’s “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.” Audiences will see many other improvements including an upgraded stage, original choreography, live music during performances and sets designed to incorporate the natural surroundings of Lake Tahoe.
Jan Powell, the festival’s new artistic director, came to Lake Tahoe from Portland, Oregon where she founded the Tygres Heart Shakespeare Company. She is also a former president of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America. In preparing for the new season, she brought in a new team of designers, directors, and technical staff. She also traveled the U.S. to cast the festival’s company of actors. One of Powell’s prime goals is to combine local influence with national and international talent for the festivals productions. “We’re thrilled to be able to tap into the vast talent in the Reno-Tahoe area and make it an intrinsic part of creating our new artistic vision in this community,” said Powell. “Our goal is to support and utilize the talent base in the region as well as bring new talent in from the rest of the country, in order to create an exceptional theatre experience for our audiences.”
Powell’s artistic philosophy is demonstrated by her decision to invite London’s Michael Walling to guest direct this summer’s presentation of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Walling is the founder of London’s Border Crossings Theatre and Combined Arts which was created as a way to literally cross geographic borders and unite cultures through theatre arts.
Walling’s ‘Midsummer’ is set in contemporary Lake Tahoe and draws inspiration from the area’s rich Native American heritage to give the play a distinctive Western quality. “My experiences producing plays throughout the world couldn’t have prepared me for the immense and awe-inspiring landscape I encountered when first visiting Lake Tahoe,” said Walling. “It quickly became my muse. The combination of the high alpine environment and radiant azure waters opened my mind to a dreamlike and spiritual state that I was able to weave into the production along with the history of the Native American peoples of the region.” Catherine Atack, executive director for the Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival adds, “Michael’s experience in translating Shakespeare’s works into a variety of contexts and using the plays to create a socially relevant dialogue is exactly what we were looking for during our inaugural season with our own production team.
More than 30,000 people attend Lake Tahoe’s productions each year according to statistics released by festival management. The plays are complemented by food and regional wines from Shakespeare’s Kitchen, the festival’s cafe. The 2008 season starts July 10 with “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and runs through August 17. The festival is located in Sand Harbor State Park on the northeastern shore of Lake Tahoe in Nevada. Tickets and information about the 2008 season are available at the Lake Tahoe Festival website at www.laketahoeshakespeare.com.
