VSF prepares for comic opening of 2011 season
The Virginia Shakespeare Festival will open its 33rd season on July 6 with the production of The Comedy of Errors, directed by Jack Young. The Comedy of Errors is one of the Bard’s earlier plays and is based on the old Roman comedy Menaechmi by Plautus. It is the story of twin brothers and their twin servants, separated in infancy and now searching for each other.
The play is Shakespeare’s shortest; however, it is full of comic potential with a series of mistaken identities, including a pair of sisters who alternately are involved with the twin brothers.
Director Jack Young, former artistic director of the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival and also of the Warehouse Theatre in Greenville, S.C., stages this Comedy of Errors in its original Roman setting— albeit a very colorful Roman world that feels much like Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.
“The shows we think of as classic comedies in the United States, ‘I Love Lucy’, ‘Abbot and Costello’, and ‘Bugs Bunny,’ all have their roots in this play,” Young said.
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The Comedy of Errors opens July 6 and plays Wednesday through Saturday evenings at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m., closing on July 17. Performances of the Virginia Shakespeare Festival are at the Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall. For ticket information, contact the Box Office at 221-2674, or purchase tickets online www.wm.edu/boxoffice.
