by William Shakespeare Director Antoni Cimolino
Surrender to a haunting story of ambition and its dark consequences, as a military hero and his wife conspire to seize the throne of Scotland.
New performances added till November 5! Tickets are on sale now.
Macbeth contains some mature subject matter, strobe lights, fog and haze, live flame and effects of lightning and thunder.
Production support is generously provided by Jane Petersen Burfield & family, by Barbara & John Schubert, by the Tremain family and by Chip & Barbara Vallis.
Support for the 2016 season of the Festival Theatre is generously provided by Claire & Daniel Bernstein.
2016: Banquo in Macbeth, Duke Frederick in As You Like It and John Gabriel Borkman in John Gabriel Borkman. 22nd season. Stratford: Favourites include last season's Epicure Mammon in The Alchemist, Gloucester in King Lear, Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls, Iago in Othello and the title role in Macbeth. He also directed the 2001 productions of Henry IV, parts 1 and 2, and last season's The Adventures of Pericles. Elsewhere: He recently played in Andrew Kushnir's Wormwood at the Tarragon Theatre. Et cetera: Mr. Wentworth is a Tony-nominated actor, a director and playwright whose work has been celebrated on Broadway, in London's West End, on television, in films and in theatres across the U.S. and Canada.
2016: Doctor in Macbeth, Oliver in As You Like It and Deuxfois, Monsieur Fleurant's Assistant in The Hypochondriac. Third season. Stratford: Marcellus, Fortinbras in Hamlet, Philip, Pedant in The Taming of the Shrew, Boyet in Love's Labour's Lost, René Descartes in Christina, The Girl King, Red Knight/Walrus in Alice Through the Looking-Glass. Elsewhere: Jaques in As You Like It, Cassius in Julius Caesar, Lucio in Measure for Measure, Jake in Stones in His Pockets, Sam in Fully Committed (Citadel); Slim in Of Mice and Men (Canadian Stage/Theatre Calgary); Tybalt/Friar Laurence in Romeo and Juliet, Roy Darwin in Counsellor-at-Law (Theatre Calgary); Everard in Age of Arousal, Ned in The Gift of the Coat (ATP); Milan in Rock 'n' Roll (Canadian Stage/Citadel); Kent in King Lear, Sir Andrew Aguecheek in Twelfth Night (Freewill Shakespeare Festival.) Film/TV: Blackstone, Mixed Blessings. Training: BFA, Acting, University of Alberta. Awards: Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Award, Measure for Measure, Citadel Theatre. Et cetera: Love to Breanna.
2016: Porter in Macbeth, Orlando in As You Like It and Ethan in Bunny. Fifth season. Stratford: The Taming of the Shrew, Possible Worlds, Peter Pan, King of Thieves, Richard III, Titus Andronicus, Cymbeline, Wanderlust. Elsewhere: Twelve Angry Men (Soulpepper); The Gift of the Magi (Theatre Orangeville); The De Chardin Project (Passe Muraille); Minotaur (YPT); RIFLES (Next Stage); The Tin Drum (UnSpun Theatre); Passion Play (Convergence, Outside the March, Sheep No Wool); Rock 'n' Roll, Habeas Corpus, Take Me Out, Amadeus, Sweeney Todd (Canadian Stage); Blood Brothers (Theatre Aquarius); Kiss of the Spider Woman, The Inspector General (Talk Is Free); You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown (YPT). Film/TV: Reign, Murdoch Mysteries, Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning, The Summit. Training: London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. Awards: Two Dora Awards (Ensemble - Passion Play, Twelve Angry Men). Et cetera: Love always to Joanne and Eliza.
2016: Seyton in Macbeth, Dr. Jim Bayliss in All My Sons and The Scavenger, Allecto's Son in The Aeneid. Sixth season. Stratford: Juan Murillo (The Physicists), Thaliard, Leonine (Pericles), Eilif (Mother Courage), Melun (King John), Alexas (Antony and Cleopatra), Bellievre (Mary Stuart), Abhorson (Measure for Measure), Cymbeline, Elektra, Richard III, Titus Andronicus. Elsewhere: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (The Mountaintop) (The Grand); Big Sam (Gone With the Wind) (RMTC); Seyton (Macbeth), Friar Laurence (Romeo and Juliet) (Chicago Shakespeare); Macduff (Macbeth) (First Folio Theatre); King (King Hedley II) (Karamu); Moustique (Dream on Monkey Mountain); Junior (Before It Hits Home); Cleveland Play House; Idaho Shakespeare Festival; Theater Wit, Chicago; The Great Lakes Theater Festival. Film/TV: The Beast (Sony), Ask Gilby, Maybe By Then, Thunder Bay (PBS). Training: Ohio University, Birmingham Conservatory. Et cetera: E.B. would like to dedicate his work to his parents and grandmother, and to the memory of his Papa, who will always be in the front row.
2016: Malcolm in Macbeth, William in As You Like It and Erhart Borkman in John Gabriel Borkman. Fourth season. Stratford: Lysimachus (Pericles), Dapper (The Alchemist), Guhl (The Physicists), Lewis, the Dauphin (King John), Swiss Cheese (Mother Courage), Mardian (Antony and Cleopatra), Prince of Aragon (The Merchant of Venice), Planchet (The Three Musketeers), Paris (Romeo and Juliet). Elsewhere: Mercutio (Romeo and Juliet), Touchstone (As You Like It), Stefano (The Tempest) (Repercussion Theatre); Fox (Pinocchio), Goat, Soldier (Alice Through the Looking-Glass) (Geordie Productions); Justin (Jesus Jello) (Sheep in Fog); Galoshin (Provincial Anecdotes) (Concordia University). Film/TV: Boucherie Halal (Babek Aliassa), Open (Tom Abray). Voice: Kojiro Sasaki, Samurai Warriors 2 (KOEI). Training: Birmingham Conservatory, Concordia University, Dawson College. Awards: 2014 Michael Mawson Award; 2013 Peter Donaldson Award; 2010 Elsa Bolam Award. Et cetera: "Thank you to my family and friends for your continued support and to all the mentors, teachers and coaches who have helped me along the way."
2016: Duncan in Macbeth, Joe Keller in All My Sons and Vilhalm Foldal in John Gabriel Borkman. Ninth season. Stratford: 2015 season: The Diary of Anne Frank, She Stoops to Conquer and The Last Wife. Joseph was part of the Stratford company from 1983 to 1987, acting in Love's Labour's Lost, Henry IV, Part 1, A Midsummer Night's Dream, King Lear, Twelfth Night, The Winter's Tale, Cymbeline, Pericles, Measure for Measure and many others. In 2000 he directed Paul Gross as Hamlet, and in 2009 he appeared in Morris Panych's play The Trespassers. Elsewhere: Founding member of Soulpepper, where he has directed and acted in many plays, including Our Town, Death of a Salesman and A Christmas Carol. He has had a long association with the Shaw Festival, as an actor and as director of plays such as When We Are Married, Harvey, Major Barbara and Widowers' Houses.
Playwright: Macbeth, As You Like It and Breath of Kings.
Born in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1564, William Shakespeare was the eldest son of John Shakespeare, a glover and tanner who rose to become an alderman and bailiff of the town, and Mary Arden, the daughter of a wealthy farmer. The exact date of his birth is unknown, but there is a record of his baptism at Stratford's Holy Trinity Church on April 26. Since an interval of two or three days between birth and baptism would have been quite common, tradition has it that he was born on April 23 - the same date as his death 52 years later.
The young Shakespeare is assumed to have attended what is now King Edward VI Grammar School in Stratford, where he would have studied rhetoric, grammar and ancient Roman literature in its original Latin. In 1582, when he was 18, he married Anne Hathaway, a farmer's daughter who was eight years his senior. Anne was pregnant at the time, and the couple's first daughter, Susanna, was born a few months afterwards in 1583. Twins followed two years later: a son, Hamnet, who died at the age of 11, and a second daughter, Judith.
Nothing further is known of Shakespeare's life until 1592, by which time he was sufficiently established as an actor and writer in London to be the target of a literary attack by a jealous fellow playwright, Robert Greene. Soon afterwards, an outbreak of plague forced the temporary closure of the theatres, and Shakespeare turned his attention instead to his long narrative poems Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece. He also began writing the Sonnets, a series of 154 complex and often ambiguous poems on themes of love, jealousy and mortality.
By 1595, Shakespeare was back in the theatre, writing and acting for the Lord Chamberlain's Men. His income as one of London's most successful dramatists enabled him in 1597 to buy what was then Stratford's second-largest house, called New Place, and in 1599 he became a shareholder in London's newly built Globe Theatre.
In 1603, when James I had succeeded Elizabeth on the throne, Shakespeare's company was awarded a royal patent, becoming known as the King's Men. Meanwhile, the playwright continued his business dealings in Stratford and in London, where in 1613 he bought a property known as the Blackfriars Gatehouse. He is believed to have spent increasing amounts of his time in Stratford from around 1609 until his death on April 23, 1616. He is buried in the town's Holy Trinity Church.
2016: Production stage manager of the Festival Theatre and assistant stage manager of A Little Night Music. 33rd season. Stratford: Maggie has been PSM at the Avon, Tom Patterson and Festival theatres for 25 seasons. Stage-management credits include Henry IV (parts 1 and 2); Iolanthe; The Imaginary Invalid; My Fair Lady; A Man for All Seasons; Kiss Me, Kate; Guys and Dolls; The Government Inspector; Coriolanus; The Mikado (national tour, London's Old Vic); and Twelfth Night (U.S. tour). Elsewhere: Maggie has worked at the St. Lawrence Centre (Toronto Arts Productions), MTC and the Grand Theatre, where she stage-managed a Dora Award-winning production of A Little Night Music. She stage-managed Eugene Onegin (Manitoba Opera), the first Dream in High Park and the first Dora Awards. She did publicity for the NDWT Company and toured Canada with the Charlottetown Festival. Training: Graduate of the National Theatre School.
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