Meet the Cast of Arden's RICHARD III, 6/12-28

Meet our King Richard - first on stage in Arden at age 14, now 9 years later he leads the cast of our Richard II production, which opens June 12 and runs 3 weekends to June 28.

Here is a link to the reservation form for tickets, or by email at reservations@ardenshakespearegild.org

Arden has a long tradition of including young people in all of our theatrical endeavors, from Shakespeare to Gilbert and Sullivan (both integral to the community for 100 years) to many other plays and musicals over the years. For nearly 20 years the Arden Shakespeare Gild has nurtured young talent every January with our Young Actors Workshop. And we have had large child and young adult retinues in many of our shows. This tradition included a "mini-Malvolio" in our Twelfth Night, a commedia del'arte Zanni troupe of kids led by an 85 year old trouper in Taming of the Shrew, townspeople in our every ten year As You Like It (Arden's namesake play), and zany scene change moments in many of our comedy productions.

We would like to highlight the role theater in Arden has had in the development of the young man chosen to take on the huge task of creating King Richard the Second for our 2014 summer production under the stars in the Field Theater on the Arden Village Green. Greg Faber has returned from the west coast and a sojourn in London, to learn the enormous role of Richard, a King who came to power at the young age of 10. The events of the play take place at a time when Richard was 29. The growth of Richard over the course of the play is a character arc that is a challenge for some of the finest actors in the world. Richard starts as a spoiled young man surrounded by flatterers, much like today's pop stars who seem to act out in public every week and sometimes come to a bad end. By the end of the play Richard has earned our respect and has become a tragic figure. We asked Greg to give us some info about his experience in Arden and in theater in general in the last decade of this 23 year-old's life.

"I first did the One Act Plays [at Arden Gild Hall] my freshman year of High School. That was 2005 I believe and I was 14. That summer I did my first Arden Shakespeare Gild Play, Hamlet [directed by Mary Catherine Kelley]. From there I did Macbeth and Comedy of Errors [directed by Henry Porreca] before heading off to school at University of Oregon. At UO I took an intensive two-term acting Shakespeare class [that] ranged from sonnets and monologues to whole scenes from the plays. My senior year I studied abroad in London where I saw a multitude of plays and participated in acting workshops. I just recently performed in Wilmington Drama League's One Act Play Festival."

Arden Shakespeare Gild is proud to offer the first chance to see this play in our series which began in 1995 but which builds on a 100 year history of Shakespeare in the Utopian Village of Arden, an "intentional" community founded on still thriving ideas of Art and Community. Training our children to become great people who love great language, we are very proud of this history..

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