Document text
- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Archives Revels Classifieds Real Estate Menu Guide Wedding Weather Subscribe Contact Us February 25, 2006 Opening night at OSF By Roberta Kent Tidings Correspondent The Oregon Shakespeare Festival always strives to do a balanced season — drama, comedy, classics and contemporary — but this season, 2006, promises to be a spectacularly successful one. It’s hard to believe that opening weekend is already upon us. And, if the play lineup for the opening weekend is an extraordinary mix, the “shoulder season” and this summer’s offerings are equally so. The season opener last night in the Angus Bowmer Theatre was Shakespeare’s “The Winter’s Tale.” Last done at OSF in 2002 on the Elizabethan Stage, this production is directed by Artistic Director Libby Appel. Appel first directed the play at OSF in 1990. “The Winter’s Tale” comes late in the Shakespeare canon, and although it is labeled a “comedy” because it has a “happy ending,” it is a particularly dark comedy to say the least, as it elegantly examines the consequences of anger, jealousy and callous “justice.” Ultimately, King Leontes’ despair, remorse and redemption are rewarded with the joyous return of that which he held most dear, but “The Winter’s Tale” is a bleak tale indeed. In this production, William Langan plays Leontes. The surprise in this 2006 season has to be a totally new production of “The Diary of Anne Frank” directed by James Edmondson. The original English translation of the diary was published in 1952; a theatrical adaptation by Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich appeared a couple of years later. Recently, Wendy Kesselman adapted that text, using material that Anne’s father, Otto Frank, “bowdlerized” from the diary and that has recently come to light. Anne’s emerging sexuality, her conflicts with her mother and the “Jewishness” of her world have become integral parts of this production. Laura Morache plays Anne Frank and is joined by Linda Alper and Tony DeBruno as her parents. OSF’s Principal Scenic Designer Richard L. Hay created a vertical set that vividly portrays the cramped quarters and the almost unbearable proximity of the residents of the secret Annex. Then, also in the Bowmer, we have something completely different. Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” is a delicious bit of witty fluff about British snobbery, mistaken identity and ridiculous plot contortions. (To give you an idea, one of the main characters discovers that, when an infant, his nanny had inadvertently left him at Victoria Station in her handbag.) Peter Amster, a stalwart OSF director of elegant nonsense, directs the production. The four young lovers are played by Jeff Cummings, Kevin Kenerly, Heather Robison and Julie Oda. Judith-Marie Bergan plays Lady Bracknell. What happens when you’ve had your 15 minutes of fame and you haven’t been able to come up with an encore? That’s the quandary examined in award-winning playwright Bridget Carpenter’s “Up,” directed by Festival newcomer Michael Barakiva in OSF’s New Theatre. Walter Griffin is the man who flew by attaching weather balloons to a lawn chair. That was sixteen years ago, and he’s never quite become airborne again. Now his world, his family and his life seem to be heading for a crash landing. Will he be able to pull out from his tailspin? That’s the question in what is described as a “haunting, bittersweet portrait of love, longing and dreams unfulfilled.” Richard Howard is Walter Griffin. That’s just opening weekend. OSF will be opening two more plays in April, during “shoulder season.” On April 1, William Inge’s “Bus Stop” ambles into the New Theatre. Inge’s bittersweet comedy about a blowzy lounge singer and the bumptious cowpoke who pursues her through a snowbound evening in a Kansas diner is directed by Libby Appel. Then, on April 22, “Intimate Apparel” by Lynn Nottage opens at the Bowmer. The play, winner of five major awards, including the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for the Best Play of 2003-04, examines the complex, intimate interior life and relationships of a black seamstress in 1905 New York. The production is directed by Timothy Bond. OSF’s summer season opens on June 17 with a production of Edmond Rostand’s crowd-pleaser “Cyrano de Bergerac.” Laird Williamson directs and festival veteran Marco Baricelli returns to play Cyrano. Also on the Elizabethan Stage will be “The Merry Wives of Windsor,” directed by OSF newcomer Andrew Tsao with G. Valmont Thomas as Falstaff. Director Bill Rauch has his debut on the Elizabethan Stage with “The Two Gentlemen of Verona.” In July, Shakespeare’s almost-never-produced “King John” opens in the New Theatre with Michael Elich. “King John” is directed by OSF’s notable movement and fight choreographer John Sipes, making his OSF directorial debut. The last play for the 2006 season is Britisher David Edgar’s take on the Robert Louis Stevenson classic, “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.” The production opens in the Bowmer on July 29. Penny Metropulos directs with James Newcomb as the famous shape-shifter. OSF Artistic Director Libby Appel describes the 2006 season as spanning “the vast range of human experience, with something for every theatregoer’s taste.” It definitely has started that way this weekend. Note that matinees at OSF begin at 1:30 pm and evening performances at 8 pm through June 4. During the summer, matinees start at 2 pm and evening performances begin at 8:30 pm, with the free Green Show performances preceding “on the bricks” outside the Elizabethan Stage and Angus Bowmer Theatre. For more information and for tickets, call the OSF box office at 482-4331. DailyTidings.com Home Page Archives | Revels | Classifieds | Real Estate Guide | Weather | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2005 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Deep Muscle Stimulator Ceramic Piggy Banks FREE Entertainment Guide Women's & Men's Slippers Accelerate Weightloss Products Backpacks Generic Viagra Vegas Travel Guide Search Engine Optimization Sportsbook Absinthe Supply Student Loans Hotel & Airline Reservations African Safari Hammocks Helzberg Diamonds Online Casinos Community Bonus Casino King of Spirits ink cartridges Mortgage Calculator Security Systems Mailing Lists Click Here Advertisement .:Advertisements:. Site Search: RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams