Shakespeare & Company proudly presents Cindy Bella (or the Glass Slipper), a brand-new take on Rossini’s classic Cinderella written by Irina Brook and Anna Brownsted and directed by Brook. The World Premiere production opened Friday in Founders’ Theatre—check out the photos!
There are so many ways to snag discounted tickets to this family friendly show. All our discounts for Berkshire residents, teachers, active duty military personnel, Senior Citizens, and students still apply.
Plus, our Family Thursdays discount is back! On December 17, tickets for families or groups of four to six people are $15 each and tickets for families or groups of seven to ten people are $10 each. Buy tickets now!
Coming in 2009! A new spin on Cinderella for children of all ages!
Cindy Bella waits tables at the Bar Magnifico, a New York City bar owned by her wicked stepfather. She loves music, her accordion and a handsome, cosmopolitan Prince who falls head over royal heels for her. But her stepfather and gorgeously ugly stepsisters plan to ruin everything, until a modern fairy godmother saves Cindy’s dream.
Join us for a FREE open rehearsal and sneak peek of this work in progress directed by Irina Brook and take part in bringing the magic to life.
Friday, December 5 at 4pm
Saturday, December 6 at 3pm & 6pm
Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre
FREE tickets available now, first-come, first-served
Click here for tickets or call the Box Office at 413-637-3353
Director-in-residence Irina Brook’s The Canterville Ghost is now on stage through November 9th. Adapted from the Oscar Wilde story by Brook with Anna Brownsted and the ensemble, The Canterville Ghost tells the story of an English ghost named Sir Simon and the American family that comes to pester him. Check out a video interview with Irina Brook; and learn about ways the whole family can enjoy the Ghost without breaking the bank. From The Boston Globe:
More silly than scary, “The Canterville Ghost” is an ideal family entertainment for the fall spooky season. It won’t frighten the little children, it won’t bore the older ones, and it even provides a dash of simple but effective theatricality for the adults in the party.
Read the full review.
The Boston Globe recently featured Irina Brook and her style of “organic adaptation,” which she is currently employing on The Canterville Ghost in the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre. Brook is Shakespeare & Company’s first director-in-residence and will direct three plays over the next nine months.
In a rehearsal room, the five actors in “The Canterville Ghost” are creating a scene for the production. They all have costume pieces — a hat, a scarf, a teacup — to help define the characters, and with a suggestion from Brook, they’re off, improvising dialogue that is sometimes hilarious, sometimes incomprehensible, but always high energy. At any given moment, Brook will stop them, consider a section and work through it, refining the details.
Read the full story (free registration may be required). The Canterville Ghost opens on Saturday. Click here to buy tickets now.
Internationally acclaimed director Irina Brook, now Shakespeare & Company’s Resident Director, is at the helm of a world-premiere adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s short story The Canterville Ghost. The story of a curmudgeonly old English ghost and the American family that just will not be haunted is being adapted on-the-fly, collaboratively between the artists during rehearsals. Irina took a break from rehearsing and writing to discuss this process, the beauty of Oscar Wilde’s story, and jumping into the deep end.
The play features Michael Hammond (Iago in this summer’s Othello) as Sir Simon the Spellbinder, Michael Toomey (Bassinet in The Ladies Man) as the head of the American family played by Dana Harrison, Alyssa Huhglett and Alexandra Lincoln. The show runs September 19 through November 9th in the new Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre. Buy tickets now.
Shakespeare & Company’s new Director-in-Residence Irina Brook recently appeared on Stephanie Abrams’ radio show “Traveling Feet” (with Press and Marketing Associate Jeremy Goodwin). She talked about her love for the scenery of the Berkshires and the cultural opportunities afforded here, the joys of Oscar Wilde and the imaginative work behind the upcoming production of The Canterville Ghost.
Download the show here or at Stephanie Abrams’ website (look for hour one of the August 23rd show — the interview with Irina Brook begins about 34 minutes into the show).
The Canterville Ghost begins previews September 19. Buy tickets now.
We’re delighted Irina Brook is joining Shakespeare & Company this season, and bringing her original adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Canterville Ghost to the new Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre.
The daughter of maverick director Peter Brook, whose A Midsummer Night’s Dream set the theatre world on fire in the 1970s, Irina set her own course and showed her own mettle early on—making her own distinctive imprint on the theatre. She has lived and worked in Paris for the last several years, built a successful company and recently won strong critical praise for her own seminal version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
The world premiere of The Canterville Ghost, directed by Irina Brook from the short story by Oscar Wilde, plays at the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre this fall, September 19–November 9, 2008. Buy tickets now.
1. What brought you to Shakespeare & Company?
It all started with a breakfast meeting with Tina Packer, just at a time when I was thinking that I would like a big change in my life and that I wanted to move from France to the States. I felt an immediate recognition of something shared. Back in France, I read up about Shakespeare & Company on the internet and was almost moved to tears when I read the mission statement which seemed so close to everything I have ever believed in—all the idealistic reasons for which I had always done theater in France appeared to be reflected in the ideas behind Shakespeare & Company. It sounds very esoteric, but yes, I was drawn to it all quite mysteriously and irresistibly.
Continue reading ‘Ten Questions with Irina Brook’
