A Shakespeare festival is always a popular and successful way to promote the arts in any community. People will go to see Shakespeare performed because it is Shakespeare, not merely because it is a favorite play or a production of a specific company. Shakespeare endures because he defines our cultural heritage, our need to explore the limits of our creativity, our need to understand our foibles, our follies, and our miraculous feats of extraordinarily simple life; in short, he defines our very humanity.
Shakespeare brings out the best of everyone involved. Those who perform him find themselves reaching above their perceived limitations. Those in attendance reach outside themselves to share the wonder they have experienced. Too many people are denied this profound linking of community either through economics or lack of opportunity. This is the reason that Joseph Papp, the renowned New York director, sought to make his New York Shakespeare Festival free: to bring the community together through their common experience of their history. The NYSF is set in the middle of Manhattan, easily accessible to everyone within the metropolitan area of New York City; the NYSF attracts incredibly high caliber performers; most importantly, the NYSF is free. Shakespeare belongs to everyone, no matter their race, their nationality, and their prejudices: we all understand and abhor the machinations of Iago trying to destroy his oppressor. We all wish for the devotion to love the child bride Juliet possessed. Every woman wishes at some point to rail at mankind in the same way that Katherine does, and all husbands fancy themselves able to tame their wives. We all bleed when we are pricked. That Shakespeare wrote in England, in English, and primarily about English characters signifies nothing: he wrote in the world, in the language his immediate audience could understand, and he wrote about humanity as a whole.
It is in this spirit that we of the Woodward Shakespeare Festival seek to unite the community in and around Fresno through the human need of a common culture. It is in this spirit that we wish to make our contribution to the culture of California's Central Valley free to the entire community. It is in this spirit that we seek to create not only performances but also a Festival to strengthen and build that community through the deeper understanding and celebration of our common cultural understanding and the paradox that what makes us unique also makes us the same.
This is the spirit of the Woodward Shakespeare Festival: we will take you from the page to the stage, building our community through culture.
The Woodward Shakespeare Festival's Mission is to present live theatre productions for the cultural education, entertainment, and inspiration of our community, and to make our contribution to the arts of California's Central Valley accessible to everyone.
All performances are free of charge.
WOODWARD SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL OBJECTIVES
- Performance of the entire Shakespeare catalog.
- Creating an internship program with local universities, colleges, and high schools.
- Hiring at least one professional (Actor's Equity Union) actor as a special guest performer per season.
- Expanding the festival to a year-round traveling performance troupe for educational purposes.
- Expanding festival facilities and locations.
- Enabling the productions to do one or several traveling performances, reaching out beyond the immediate Fresno area.
- Expanding the Festival to a year-round company.
- Achieving membership in the League of Regional Theaters (not-for-profit theaters that employ professional actors, and are represented in the annual Tony awards).
By Festival Cofounder, S. Eric Day
The Woodward Shakespeare Festival was initially conceived January 1st, by Brandon Weis and me in 2001 on a return trip from Las Vegas, Nevada. As Fresno State acting students, we knew if we were to make a positive impact on Fresno it must be theatrical. Shakespeare in the park, theater under the stars...there is nothing more romantic, more life-affirming than good Shakespeare performed like it was over 400 years ago, outdoors, fighting the elements.
That fall, I returned to Fresno to make the dream come true. With a team of friends, including: Brandon Weis, Scott Davis, Josh Feemster, and Kim Wood; I took the 10 week business course at Central Valley Business Incubator. At the end of that course we had acquired a bank account, a business license and the fictitious business name. The first performance ever produced by WSF was at the Rogue Festival in March 2004. We performed two 15 minute plays, which ironically, had nothing to do with Shakespeare.
The Rotary Amphitheater had been built by the Rotary Clubs almost 10 years prior; this treasure in Woodward Park was the obvious location for the Festival, hence the name. In Fall of 2004, Christien Sweeney and I collaborated with a lawyer (necessary despite Shakespeare’s comments) to incorporate as a non-profit, form a board, raise money and in-kind donations and plan a season. We finally reached the dream in the Summer of 2005, with the first full length productions of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, directed by Christien. I directed the second show, Romeo and Juliet.
Our first Season saw audiences of over 8,000 people. The following Summer we staged A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Macbeth, making our second season even more successful by entertaining and delighting over 12,000 people with our 22 performances...
And all for free.
On behalf of the Board of the Woodward Shakespeare Festival, I invite you to enjoy the “2007 Season of Lies and Lovers,” with exciting performances of Othello and Taming of the Shrew. This Season offers some notable advancement in the life of the Festival.
Through the Harry C. Mitchell Grant we have added new sound and light equipment that brings audiences even closer to the Bard’s glorious depictions. With the enormous efforts of a reenergized Board and a core of corporate and individual supporters, we have maintained good stewardship of the opportunity to provide free Shakespeare to the public. In J.J. Cobb and Daniel Moore, we have strong, creative directors to mold our enthusiastic troupe.
But after the money’s raised and spent, and the plays are directed and produced, the Festival owes itself to two twin forces without which it would not survive: our volunteers and your appreciation. So when you clap, or as the Bard says, help us with your good hands, clap first for our all-volunteer actors, tech staff, and crew, and then for yourself for giving us all a reason to labor for the sweetest flower in the field: Free Shakespeare for All!
Thornton Davidson
President, Board of Directors
Woodward Shakespeare Festival
- The winner of the 2007 Playwriting Contest has been announced! Terrance Macarthur won for his script All's Red that's Riding Hood. Location, date and time that Macarthur's play will be produced will be announced soon.
