ASC to Commemorate Shakespeare's Death This Weekend

The Atlanta Shakespeare Company will commemorate Shakespeare's birthday and the four hundredth anniversary of his death on April 23, 2016 with Shakespeare for Kids: Dream Scheme, an interactive, condensed version of A Midsummer Night's Dream designed for children.

Shakespeare for Kids helps acclimate young students to Shakespeare before they encounter his works in an academic setting in high school, as Education and Training Director Laura Cole explains: "It is my experience that for Georgia's kids they encounter Shakespeare for the first time in high school. And for many it is a startling, confusing and potentially unpleasant experience. If students can hear and learn the names, plots, characters and bits of Shakespeare's intricate language earlier in their school careers, perhaps in 5th grade, or Kindergarten, think about what a tremendous advantage that could give them once they get to ninth grade." ASC's performance of Dream Scheme will contribute to 400 Dreams: Shakespeare Around the Globe, the Shakespeare Theatre Association's project to honor Shakespeare's legacy by chronicling performances and celebrations of Shakespeare's plays around the globe.

Also on Shakespeare's birthday, ASC will celebrate the work of several senior company members in a reception following the opening night performance of Bill Cain's Equivocation, which will be directed by former ASC apprentice Jaclyn Hoffman. ASC is very pleased to announce that two senior company members, stage manager Cindy Kearns and actor Troy Willis, were recently recognized by the Actors Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers, as the two Equity members who have worked on more Shakespeare productions than any of their Equity peers in the last decade. ASC will also recognize the dedication of three other senior company members: Tony Brown, who will complete his three thousandth performance at ASC during the upcoming production of Two Gentlemen of Verona, Doug Kaye, who is celebrating thirty seasons as an actor at ASC, and Drew Reeves, who is in his twenty-third season as an actor, fight director, and associate producer at the Shakespeare Tavern Playhouse.

About the Atlanta Shakespeare Company at the Shakespeare Tavern Playhouse The Atlanta Shakespeare Company's Education programs provide opportunities for students, educators and parents throughout Georgia and the Southeast to experience the power of Shakespeare's language and dramatic vision through the play, passion, poetry, active participation and performance using dynamic, language-based methods. ASC Education serves students from K-12 grades in fifty-four Georgia counties and six southern states with matinees in Atlanta, touring productions, workshops, residencies and other classroom programs as well as offering professional training to emerging artists at the Shakespeare Tavern Playhouse. The Shakespeare Tavern Playhouse is Atlanta's only professional Equity theater company producing the works of William Shakespeare and select classic modern plays throughout the year, in an Elizabethan Globe-inspired playhouse on Peachtree Street in downtown Atlanta, Georgia. This past year the Atlanta Shakespeare Company reached a total of over 20,000 students and 30,000 adults.

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