Virginia Shakespeare Festival announces 2015 season
The Virginia Shakespeare Festival has announced its 37th season, featuring two of Shakespeare’s most beloved plays, All’s Well That Ends Well and Antony and Cleopatra at Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall on the campus of William & Mary July 8-Aug. 2.
Director Steven Breese, whose stagings of Romeo & Juliet, Two Gentlemen of Verona and Much Ado About Nothing have delighted audiences, now returns to impart his deft comic hand to All’s Well That Ends Well. His stellar cast includes Kathleen Huber (Law & Order, numerous Off-Broadway and regional credits) as the Countess and Mia Hutchinson-Shaw (traveling all the way from Scotland’s Royal Conservatory) as the heroine Helena. It’s one of Shakespeare most interesting comedies with complex characters and lots of questions for actors and directors to answer on the way to its surprising ending.
Artistic Director Christopher Owens will continue on from last year’s production of Julius Caesar to what might be thought its sequel with his direction of Antony and Cleopatra featuring two mighty actors in Edward Stanley and Aleisha Force playing the title roles. Both are taking breaks from their current Off-Broadway runs for six weeks in a show that will rest in 30 B.C. but have an operatic feel to the size of its design (think Aida, but without the elephant).
The 2015 Virginia Shakespeare Festival offers performances at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesdays-Saturdays; and at 2 p.m. on Sundays in Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall on the campus of William & Mary. Tickets are $30 for adults, $18 for students, $12 for children (under 14), $24 for groups of 15 or more, and discounted rates for season tickets. Tickets can be purchased in person at PBK Hall, 601 Jamestown Rd., over the phone by calling 757-221-2674 and online at www.wm.edu/boxoffice. For box office hours, visit www.wm.edu/vsf.
