Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival Announces Directors for Upcoming Season

Casting 100+ roles, designing hundreds of costumes and myriad lighting and sound cues, and hiring 134 seasonal staff, the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival prepares to open its 19th season. Featuring Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet and The Merry Wives of Windsor, the classic Irish comedy The Playboy of the Western World, the Tony Award-winning musical A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Robin Hood, Shakespeare for Kids, and The Green Show, the season runs June 4 - August 8 on the Center Valley campus of DeSales University.

"The joy in a season like ours lies in both its breadth - two very different classic comedies, a vaudevillian musical farce, and a great tragedy, taking us to Verona, Windsor, Ireland, and ancient Rome," says Producing Artistic Director Patrick Mulcahy, "and in the way these very different plays shed light from different angles on a common human experience: romantic love."

Directors for each production were chosen nearly a year in advance of the season. In the early years of the Shakespeare Festival, Rick Sordelet served as fight choreographer for several productions. He has since established an international reputation as a fight choreographer and director, with more than 50 productions on Broadway to his credit.

"After watching his rousing and inspiring interactions with the actors and designers while he was here doing the fights for Cyrano de Bergerac in 2008, Dennis Razze and I remarked on what a terrific director Rick is," says Mulcahy. "What better person to direct a play about the risks and rewards of overwhelming passion than a man who has spent his career, at the pinnacle of our industry, directing the most emotionally explosive moments in so many great plays." He will use both skills as he directs Shakespeare's masterpiece, Romeo & Juliet, which runs on the Main Stage July 21 - August 8.

Also returning to the director's chair following last season's effervescent production of A Midsummer Night's Dream is Jim Helsinger, taking the helm for Shakespeare's rollicking comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor. In a unique turn of events, Helsinger will also play the role of Master Ford, husband to one of the "merry wives." The production runs July 14 - August 8, in the Schubert Theatre.

Considered a comic masterpiece, The Playboy of the Western World by J.M. Synge is often produced by theatres devoted to the classics, and was recently revived Off Broadway by one company and toured internationally by another. William Butler Yeats, a friend of Synge's, described it as "noble art, so full of passion and heroic beauty," and "created from the delight of expression... happiness and health of mind." It is refreshing and unique, one of a kind really, though it has had a profound impact on most Irish drama written since. James J. Christy, a Barrymore Award winner who directed PSF's Twelfth Night in 2008, returns to the director's chair. Playboy will be performed in the Schubert Theatre, June 16 - July 3.

With a title that's a direct descendant from vaudeville, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum will be performed on the Main Stage June 23 - July 11. Directed by Dennis Razze, PSF associate artistic director, who directed 1776 last season, Forum won six Tony Awards when it debuted on Broadway in 1962, including Best Musical.

PSF Education Director Erin Hurley will direct three productions: Robin Hood (running June 4 - August 7), Shakespeare for Kids (July 28 - August 7) and the free outdoor Green Show (June 16 - August 7).

"Making connections is one of the great joys of preparing a season of plays for our patrons," Mulcahy says. "Connecting the right plays to the current moment, connecting the best artists to these extraordinary plays - and to each other in collaborative teams - connecting our senses with our hearts and minds, and connecting timeless insights into humanity to our experiences today."

Providing operating support for the entire Festival are Associate Season Sponsors: The Morning Call, Harry C. Trexler Trust, and Service Electric Cable TV and Communications. Director Sponsors are Linda Lapos and Paul Wirth.

Season tickets and single tickets are available by calling 610-282-WILL [9455] or online at pashakespeare.org.

Need more Philadelphia Theatre News in your life?
Sign up for all the news on the Summer season, discounts & more...