Shakespeare & Company's Education Program announces auditions and interviews for its 2020 Northeast Regional Tour of Shakespeare. Auditions will be held next month on October 5 - 7 on the Company's Lenox campus on 70 Kemble Street. The 2020 Tour will bring two Shakespeare productions, Macbeth and The Comedy of Errors, to over 20,000 students at schools and community centers throughout the Northeast.
The Company seeks six Actor/Teaching Artists for our twenty-two-week non-Equity touring contract. The 2020 Tour will include Macbeth, directed by Kelly Galvin, and The Comedy of Errors directed by Michael Toomey. Each will be presented in a 90-minute format by the same cast of six actors, most of whom will play multiple roles in each production (doubling subject to final casting). In addition to the performances, the Actor/Teaching Artists will be responsible for leading 15-minute moderated talkbacks following each performance and 45-minute educational workshops in the schools before or after the show. All Actor/Teaching Artists will also be responsible for stage management duties, which will include but are not limited to assisting with lights, sound, sets, costumes, and props while on the road, driving to and from bookings, and some administrative tasks. "I'm excited to be directing again for Shakespeare & Company's Northeast Regional Tour-and to have the chance to reckon with the captivating and terrifying Macbeth," said Director Kelly Galvin. "Shakespeare's plays are subversive and funny, thoughtful and physical, expressive and confrontational-the opportunity to live within them for five months is invaluable to any artist longing for a deeper experience of Shakespeare in performance. Bringing these stories alive for students-who are some of the most honest, authentic audiences I've ever encountered-is the icing on the cake.""The tour has taught me more about myself as a performer, a collaborator and simply as a human than I could have imagined," said 2019 Tour Actor Kirsten Peacock. "When do we get the opportunity to work on a show, or two in this case, with one group of actors for 9 months? And the audiences we perform for, and their responses to the show, are so varied, it's never the same show twice. On top of that, the educational component that is integrated into our work deepens and expands the work we do. It encourages us to really engage with the students we work with: to play, to explore, to enjoy Shakespeare's language and stories, in essence, to learn with them. In short, the tour is the most challenging and rewarding work I've ever experienced. If you can, do it."
To book the Tour in your community or for more general information click here. For more information about the Tour contract and the audition process click here. Shakespeare & Company's Education Programs are made possible, in part, with funding from Arts Midwest, the Dr. Robert C. and Tina Sohn Foundation, the Cornelia P. Bailey Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Massachusetts Cultural Council (a state agency) YouthReach, The Feigenbaum Foundation, The Charles H. Hall Foundation, Julia Querin and Sing Your Song, Inc., and the Local Cultural Councils-supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council-of Lee, Lenox, New Marlborough, Northern Berkshire, Pittsfield, Richmond, Sheffield, Springfield, Stockbridge, and Tyringham; as well as many other families, individuals, and local businesses.Photo By Jay Sundar Rajan
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