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Letter from the President

Dear Friends of OSF:

Welcome to the 2010 season, the 75th anniversary of Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

As visionary and as determined as he was, Angus Bowmer, our beloved founder, could not have fully foreseen what he was launching when he staged two Shakespeare plays over a summer weekend in 1935 with a playbill that proclaimed, “First Annual Shakespearean Festival.”

From its humble beginnings on the rustic site of an abandoned Chautauqua structure, OSF has grown to become the largest rotating repertory theater in the United States. In 2009, in the midst of a difficult economy, longtime and new audience members purchased a record number of tickets. We are grateful to them and pleased to welcome them and others to this exciting anniversary season.

In 2010, we present eleven plays in our three theaters in a season that runs for more than eight months. We celebrate Angus by offering the two plays he produced in 1935, Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice. Henry IV Part One and the timeless Hamlet are our other two Shakespeare dramas.

As always, the list includes great contemporary works, including two world premieres – American Night, the first of the U.S. history plays that we have commissioned, and Throne of Blood, based on the classic Akira Kurosawa film.

Those, and more, allow you to put together a rich variety of drama, comedy, and music when you choose your Ashland plays.

Our theater and our town remain an affordable and entertaining vacation and cultural experience. You’ll find not only world-class theater, but also a small-town atmosphere with wonderful restaurants, great accommodations and a wide range of family activities to complement your stay, including golf, skiing, river rafting, fishing, gallery browsing, or a walk through Lithia Park.

Visit the OSF website (www.osfashland.org) for all the latest information on plays and schedules. You can order your tickets through the website, as more patrons are doing all the time. Or you can talk by phone to our talented and friendly Box Office staff, who can answer your questions and take your ticket orders. The membership section of the website will tell you more about the benefits of joining and supporting OSF.

We look forward to seeing you in Ashland for this historic anniversary season.

Sincerely,
Jim Risser