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July 10, 2008 Shakespeare Santa Cruz summer festival opens July 15By Scott Rappaport (831) 459-2496; srapp@ucsc.edu
Shakespeare Santa Cruz (SSC) kicks off its 27th annual summer festival on July 15 with an innovative blend of Shakespearean plays and contemporary works by American playwrights. The 2008 season features Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet and All's Well That Ends Well, plus Burn This, by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lanford Wilson, and Bach at Leipzig, by the critically acclaimed young playwright, Itamar Moses. All four plays will be performed in repertory through August 31. "That we can explore new and exciting directions theatrically is a direct result of the strong artistic foundation Paul Whitworth has brought to SSC during his leadership," noted Marco Barricelli, who took over the reins as SSC's artistic director in January. Romeo and Juliet is directed by Kim Rubinstein (Much Ado About Nothing, 2007), who considers Shakespeare's tragic tale of star-crossed lovers betrayed by an adult world as "the greatest love story ever written" and still highly relevant today. “At the heart of the play, the ultimate tragedy occurs because the adults didn’t listen or listened too late," said Rubinstein. "It is in the small moments of our everyday lives--moments where we don’t treat each other with kindness and compassion and listening--that is where the seeds of violence begin.” All’s Well That Ends Well will be directed by SSC veteran Tim Ocel, who notes that the play explores the question of nobility--"are you born with it or do you achieve it through your actions?" "This play is on a very human scale; there are no heroics and it is brutally honest," noted Ocel, who is based in St. Louis where he directs theater and opera. Lanford Wilson's Burn This premiered in New York in 1987 with Joan Allen and John Malkovich in starring roles; Allen won a Tony Award for her performance. It's a witty, engaging, and painfully human story by Wilson, whose Talley's Folly received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1979. Burn This will be directed by Michael Barakiva, who has worked with the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center, Arena Stage, and New Dramatists. A winner of the David Merrick Prize in Drama, Barakiva is based in New York City and will be making his SSC directorial debut. Bach at Leipzig was written by 30-year-old playwright Itamar Moses, who is considered one of the leading new voices in American theater, and whose work has been compared to that of Tom Stoppard. Moses made his mark with this brilliantly written, farcical tale of “a bunch of average guys trying to get ahead in their chosen profession.” Bach at Leipzig is directed by Art Manke, co-founder of A Noise Within, L.A.’s acclaimed classical theater company, where he served as artistic director for its first 10 seasons. Manke directed the acclaimed 2006 production of this play at South Coast Repertory, where he won the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Direction.
• Michael Warren on Shakespeare UCSC professor emeritus Michael Warren offers a lively talk on this season's two Shakespeare offerings, Romeo and Juliet and All's Well That Ends Well.
All's Well That Ends Well director Tim Ocel, Romeo and Juliet dramaturg Karen Kettnich, and professor Michael Warren discuss the directors' visions and interpretations of the two Shakespeare plays this season.
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