This week, Sweet Wag Shakespeare, the Mary Baldwin University Master of Fine Arts company for 2015–16, is performing at the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival.
Representatives from the festival saw the company’s Puns N’ Roses Tour at the Blackfriars Playhouse in December and extended the invitation to perform in West Chester, Pennyslvania, during the 2016 Festival. Both Shakespeare’s War of the Roses and As You Like It, directed by company members Marshall B Garrett and Merlyn Q. Sell respectively, were chosen for performance in the festival as spotlight productions.
The festival is part of the Rubenstein Arts Access Program and is funded by David and Alice Rubenstein. The regional festival was established “to recognize, reward, and celebrate the exemplary work produced in college and university theaters.” More than 1,300 productions and 200,000 students nationwide participated in festival events last year.
Sweet Wag Shakespeare’s attendance at the 2016 festival marks a first for Mary Baldwin’s Shakespeare and Performance graduate program. In keeping with their stated mission to “encourage audiences to expect artistic excellence” from themselves as well as future Shakespeare and Performance companies, company members hope that their participation in the festival will provide the unique MFA company model higher visibility within the greater theatrical community.
In addition to performing at the festival, six company members have received Irene Ryan nominations for their individual performances. The Irene Ryan Acting Scholarships “provide recognition, honor, and financial assistance to outstanding student performers.” Molly Harper, Meredith Johnson, and Natalia Razak Wallace received nominations for their work in Shakespeare’s War of the Roses. From As You Like It, Ian Charles, Adrienne Johnson, and Aubrey Whitlock were also nominated. Both shows provided their actors with substantial acting challenges as each actor was asked to portray a minimum of four characters, some simultaneously, within the course of a 90-minute production. Adrienne Johnson will be competing in the Irene Ryan competition at the festival with Mary Baldwin Master of Letters student Josh Williams as her partner. Winning at the regional level would propel Johnson and Williams on to compete nationally at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC this spring.
Performing at the festival is only the first event on Sweet Wag Shakespeare’s ambitious 2016 agenda. They continue their season with a production of The City Nightcap opening February 1. Next, they will be joined by visiting director Leslie Reidel of the University of Delaware for a fairy-tale production of Shakespeare’s Cymbeline, opening in March. March 28 through April 5 the company will celebrate a year of hard work, fun, and ambitions realized with a “Sweet Festival of Wags,” featuring performances of all six of their full productions, a staged reading of a new work, and a among other events.
For more information about Sweet Wag Shakespeare, visit sweetwagshakespeare.com.