To Be or Not To Be: Ashland to Seattle

June 30 - July 2

I spent three days in Ashland, Oregon, mostly at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.  This is an incredible theater festival that has been going on for 75 years.  While I love working on our little theater with the Ancon Theatre Guild, it’s amazing watching the big time productions. However, like any entertainment, some I liked and others not so much.

I managed to see three plays at the OSF, and one community theater production in a nearby town.  At the OSF I saw a play called Medea/MacBeth/Cinderella which combined all three plays simultaneously.  While I really appreciated the production value and acting, I found the combination extremely hard to follow and very confusing.  Most comments I heard agreed.  I also saw an adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Merry Wives of Windsor”, set in Windsor, Iowa.  I’ve basically come to the conclusion that most of The Bard’s comedies are purile, which makes sense given the “lower classes” that they were intended for.  I found this production silly to the point of ridiculous.

One night I went to the next town, Talent, and saw “1776”, a musical about the Congress’ discussion over American independence.  I hadn’t realized that this play got the Tony for best musical in 1969, beating out “Hair”.  Obviously a political decision, given the mood of the country at the time.  In any event, despite having to ride through the rain to get to the theater, the play was extremely well done.  I was also very jealous of the new theater that the local community theater group had built.

But the highlight of my time in Ashland was a play called “White Snake”, based around an old Chinese legend.  While it was incredible in all aspects (acting, staging, sets, music), the fact that the writer/director had actually written it while already in rehearsals made it even more extraordinary.  Evidently this is her style, and she doesn’t develop the dialog until she sees how the actors are doing, then develops it to incorporate their personalities.

I also got to take a backstage tour of the OSF theaters.  This was sold out, but when I explained my interest and involvement in the theater in Panama they were kind enough to fit me in.  It was an interesting couple of hours seeing how the “big boys” stage a production.