Reviewed by:

• Oregon Shakespeare Festival
• Lindsey Mantoan

In the wake of tremendous upheaval at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF), from leadership turnover to the COVID-19 pandemic to wildfires to audiences balking at a reduction in plays by Shakespeare in favor of new works by diverse playwrights, OSF produced a “Season of Love” in 2023. This season featured five live productions, down from eleven in previous years: Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night, Rent, The Three Musketeers, and the one-person tour-de-force Where We Belong. Showcasing beloved titles aimed at bringing back audiences still reluctant to go to live theatre, the “Season of Love” generally avoided the hard-hitting contemporary socio-political issues recent productions have explored (institutional racism, gender identity, queer love) and focused instead on widely appealing themes of romance, connection, and family (both found and biological).

Despite the move toward programming with broad appeal, no doubt intended to boost the organization’s financial outlook, OSF emailed patrons in April 2023, on the eve of opening, with a plea entitled “Save Our Season,” informing the theatregoing community that the entire 2023 season might be shut down due to lack of funds: “Right now, OSF is in crisis. . . . We see the path forward to sustained success, but we need your help to get there. We have set an ambitious goal of raising $2.5 million dollars over the next four months in order to save our season and to help us continue producing the world-class theatre that keeps you coming back home to OSF year after year.” Two months later, the organization had met that goal and issued another, more ambitious one: $7.3 million to complete the season. Robust community support for the festival, paired with a crowd-pleasing season, generated a better financial outlook for the festival than it has enjoyed in recent years.

But financial woes are only one of the challenges the organization faced this season. After a series of separations and furloughs in January, Artistic Director Nataki Garrett stepped into the position of interim executive director, a role she juggled with her artistic director duties and her work as director of Romeo and Juliet. Yet, on the eve of the production’s opening night, it was announced that Garrett was stepping down as artistic director, ending a tumultuous three years at the helm of the 88-year-old festival. In July, Tim Bond was announced as Garrett’s successor. He is a familiar face at OSF, having directed How I Learned What I Learned in 2022 and serving as the festival’s associate artistic director for eleven seasons, from 1996 through 2007. A savvy choice by the board, Bond brings experience as an artistic director of two other organizations and is a favorite of OSF audiences.

Amid all this offstage drama, OSF produced outstanding theatre. In the Angus Bowmer Theatre, Garrett’s inspired Romeo and Juliet, set against the backdrop of West Coast economic disparity, centered the consequences of scarcity on community formation. As the two houses, both alike in dignity, broke into new mutiny, Friar Lawrence moved in and out of the homeless encampment that provided the setting for the piece, traveling in a camper that delivered faith, hope, food, and COVID masks. The clever scenic design featured projections of a bridge with traffic coming and going, while a tent city and RV shell failed to shelter the characters from the elements and their own bad impulses. A love letter to Oakland, Garrett’s production leaned into the youthful impetuousness of these most famous adolescent lovers, with the balcony scene drawing uproarious laughs from the audience. Vocal outbursts and impromptu dance moves signaled the emotional immaturity of the teenage characters, whose conflict with each other seemed less rooted in ancient grudge than in juvenile ego.

Taking place “sometime between the great recession and now,” the production employed contemporary hip-hop beats and screen-based technology: Friar Lawrence’s text to Romeo about Juliet having been (temporarily) poisoned failed to send, a cellular service black hole in the homeless encampment marking yet another degree of the isolation that unhoused populations face. Characters deliberately...

 审阅者：

• 
  俄勒冈莎士比亚节
•  林赛·曼托安

俄勒冈莎士比亚戏剧节 (OSF) 经历了巨大的剧变，从领导层更替到 COVID-19 大流行，再到野火，再到观众对减少莎士比亚戏剧转而青睐不同剧作家的新作品感到犹豫，OSF 制作了一个“莎士比亚剧季” 2023 年，《爱的爱》。这一季有 5 部现场制作作品，比前几年的 11 部有所减少：《罗密欧与朱丽叶》、《第十二夜》、《吉屋出租》、《三个火枪手》以及独角戏《我们所属的地方》。 《爱的季节》展示了深受喜爱的作品，旨在吸引仍然不愿去现场剧院的观众，总体上避免了近期作品所探讨的尖锐的当代社会政治问题（制度种族主义、性别认同、酷儿爱情），而是将重点放在关于浪漫、联系和家庭（包括发现的和生物学的）等广泛吸引人的主题。

尽管转向具有广泛吸引力的节目，无疑是为了提升该组织的财务前景，但 OSF 仍于 2023 年 4 月开幕前夕向观众发送了一封名为“拯救我们的季节”的请求，告知剧院观众，整个 2023 年由于缺乏资金，季节可能会被关闭：“目前，OSF 正处于危机之中。 。 。 。我们看到了持续成功的道路，但我们需要您的帮助才能实现这一目标。我们制定了一个雄心勃勃的目标，即在接下来的四个月内筹集 250 万美元，以挽救我们的演出季，并帮助我们继续制作世界一流的剧院，让您年复一年地回到 OSF。”两个月后，该组织实现了这一目标，并发布了另一个更加雄心勃勃的目标：730 万美元来完成整个赛季。社区对音乐节的大力支持，加上观众喜爱的音乐节，为音乐节带来了比近年来更好的财务前景。

但财务困境只是该组织本赛季面临的挑战之一。一月份经过一系列离职和休假后，艺术总监纳塔基·加勒特 (Nataki Garrett) 出任临时执行总监，她要兼顾艺术总监的职责和《罗密欧与朱丽叶》导演的工作。然而，就在该剧首映前夕，加勒特宣布辞去艺术总监一职，结束了这个拥有 88 年历史的电影节的动荡三年。 7月，蒂姆·邦德被宣布为加勒特的继任者。他是 OSF 的一张熟悉面孔，曾执导过 2022 年的《我如何学习我所学到的》，并在 1996 年至 2007 年的十一季中担任电影节副艺术总监。另外两个组织，也是 OSF 受众的最爱。

在所有这些幕后戏剧中，OSF 制作了出色的戏剧。在安格斯·鲍默剧院，加勒特的灵感之作《罗密欧与朱丽叶》以西海岸经济差距为背景，集中讲述了稀缺对社区形成的影响。当两所同样尊严的房子爆发新的叛乱时，劳伦斯修士进进出出为这件作品提供背景的无家可归者营地，乘坐一辆露营车旅行，运送信仰、希望、食物和新冠口罩。巧妙的场景设计以桥的投影为特色，交通来来往往，而帐篷城和房车外壳未能保护角色免受自然因素和他们自己不良冲动的影响。加勒特的作品是一封写给奥克兰的情书，讲述了这些最著名的青少年恋人的青春浮躁，阳台的场景引来了观众的哄堂大笑。爆发的声音和即兴的舞蹈动作标志着青少年角色情感上的不成熟，他们之间的冲突似乎不是源于古老的怨恨，而是源于青少年的自我。

这部作品发生在“大衰退和现在之间的某个时候”，采用了当代嘻哈音乐和基于屏幕的技术：劳伦斯修士给罗密欧写的关于朱丽叶（暂时）中毒的短信未能发送，这是一个蜂窝服务黑洞。无家可归者营地标志着无家可归者面临的又一程度的孤立。人物刻意...