About the Plays

104 years ago, Senior Class commencement plays were performed under a grove of large cottonwood trees on the east lawn of Old Main. Prior to the advent of electric lighting, outdoor events were largely confined to daylight hours; however, when electric lights became available in 1901, it was possible to play late into the evening, and performances started at the fashionable post-dinner hour of 8 o'clock. After World War I interrupted the 19-year annual tradition, Dr. George F. Reynolds--an internationally-known Elizabethan Theatre scholar--administered the Theatre Program at CU. In 1936, he helped develop the plans for the Mary Rippon Outdoor Theatre. (Mary Rippon(1850-1935) was the first woman professor at the University of Colorado, and the first woman in the United States to teach at a state university. Head of the Department of Germanic Languages and Literature, she also served, without financial compensation, as Dean of Women. She was known as a kind, generous, and inspiring teacher who shared the savings from her meager salary with needy students, and whose enthusiasm for life and learning contributed to the enrichment of the entire community.)

The Mary Rippon Outdoor Theatre was officially completed in 1939, but no plays were staged there until 1944, when Shakespeare teacher and bibliographer James Sandoe was asked to direct a play for the coming summer. Because the University Theatre facility was occupied by the Department of the Navy due to the war effort, Sandoe decided to try out the new Mary Rippon with a production of Romeo and Juliet. Over the next couple of years, he staged two more of Shakespeare's works--The Merchant of Venice in 1945, and Henry IV, Part I in 1946. The following summer, English professor Jack Crouch took over, continuing a progression which has continued unbroken until the present, with one exception: in 1957, the Shakespeare play was staged in the indoor University Theater. Crouch himself directed seven plays over the next ten years, and founded the Colorado Shakespeare Festival in 1958, increasing the summer repertoire from one to three productions with Julius Caesar, Hamlet, and The Taming of the Shrew. He stayed on as Executive Director through the 1963 season.

In 1973, a record-breaking 16,931 people saw the CSF season during its run of 17 performances. And, with the production of Cymbeline in 1975, CSF completed the canon--a record-setting event-- the first time that an American festival had done so. It was also, according to the 1975 souvenir program, apparently "the first canon completion by an entirely non-professional repertory company, and only the second by an educational institution."

The Colorado Shakespeare Festival of the '70's was characterized by an increasing utilization of scenery to enhance the presentation of the works (although in 1973 Jim Sandoe's production of Pericles was performed on a nearly-empty stage). In 1974, CSF veteran W. Joseph Zender was commissioned to design a unit set which would allow the shows to return to a simpler, primary setting, but by the following year his construction had disappeared, and for the next two years, the plays were performed again on a platform stage. Historically, the Rippon's problematic original design has been continually altered and improved, until in 1981 Producing Director Daniel S.P. Yang engaged Richard Devin to make the Rippon space more theatrical and to create more lighting areas on the stage. The changes were dramatic, and even today the improvement of the Mary Rippon Outdoor Theatre continues.

The Festival hires four directors, as many as forty actors, nine designers and more than 150 production personnel. Add to these a small administrative staff, apprentices, interns and volunteers and the CSF company includes as many as 200 individuals, most of whom arrive in Colorado in mid-May from all parts of the country (and the world) and begin work on the same date. During the early rehearsal period, a typical workday for many CSF personnel begins at 9:00 in the morning and may wind down as late as 11:00 at night. For the most part, the company is housed in proximity to the theatre and many members cook and eat meals, walk to work, and explore the town together--establishing a camaraderie that results in a remarkable esprit-de-corps, which translates directly to the stage.

In 1992, The CSF was named as one of the top Shakespeare festivals in the nation by TIME Magazine. That same year, the Festival received the Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts and the Denver Drama Critic's Circle Award for "Best Season for a Theatre Company."

The CSF is active in community outreach and education year-round, with high-school touring programs, workshops for secondary school students, and several summer programs for middle and high-school students, teachers, and parents. CSF also offers a number of courses on Shakespeare through the University, and publishes an educational newsletter, Preview. It's Web site is an outstanding resource for teachers and students alike. (Click on Education for more information.)

Background Information

• Now in its 49th Season, The Colorado Shakespeare Festival (CSF) is a professional, Equity Guest Artist and non-Equity summer theatre festival.

• Begun in 1958 with productions of Julius Caesar, Hamlet and The Taming of a Shrew, the CSF now presents four productions each summer, several plays on the stage of the picturesque, Greek-style Mary Rippon Outdoor Theatre and several in the indoor, proscenium University Theatre, both located on the grounds of the University of Colorado at Boulder.

• With the production of Cymbeline in 1975, the CSF became the seventh theatre in the world to complete the entire Shakespearean canon of 37 plays.

• The 2006 Season will feature:
  
  The Tempest, dir. by Patrick Kelly
  As You Like It, dir. by Gavin Cameron Webb
  The Merchant of Venice, dir. by Tom Markus
  Unexpected Shaxpere!, dir. by Ron Hippe

• The 2005 Season productions were
  
  Twelfth Night, dir. by Robert Cohen
  The Winter's Tale, dir. by Cynthia Croot
  Othellodir. by Jane Page
  Unexpected Shaxpere! dir. by Ron Hippe

• The Colorado Shakespeare Festival draws as many as 40,000 audience members each season, 10% of whom come from outside the state of Colorado.

• Each summer The Colorado Shakespeare Festival hires 4 directors, approximately 40 actors, 9 designers, and over 150 production personnel. Including the administrative staff, apprentices, interns, and volunteers, the entire CSF company may number well over 200.

• CSF also offers several other programs to accompany the Festival, such as Shakespeare in Production, a sequence of courses that deals with all aspects of producing Shakespeare’s plays, Greenshow activities including free music and dance performances, a free Sunday night lecture series, and school outreach programs.

• "Living Shakespeare," the CSF school outreach program, has given over 600 performances throughout Colorado public schools since its inception in 1991, and is seen annually by approximately 5,000 students and teachers.