Ashland, Ore. -- The Oregon Shakespeare Festival has named Bill Rauch as the new artistic director today. He will succeed artistic director Libby Appel, who will be retiring at the end of the 2007 season. Rauch will work part-time beginning in November of this year to plan the 2008 playbill, select design teams and cast actors for the 11 productions. He begins full-time in June 2007.
"I am overjoyed by this appointment," said Rauch from his Los Angeles home. "From the moment I first worked in Ashland over five years ago, I fell in love with the Festival's three-theater campus, the ever-surprising rotating rep of plays, and the brilliant company of artists and administrators. With our devoted and multi-generational audiences, OSF is a true peoples' theater: not only preserving the past, but creating the theater of the future. Building on the Festival's distinguished history and Libby Appel's inspiring legacy in particular, I look forward to partnering with Paul Nicholson to lead OSF to achieve its full potential as both a regional resource and a truly national theater company."
A freelance director, Rauch co-founded Cornerstone Theater in Los Angeles the nation's definitive community-based arts organizationwhere he was artistic director for 20 years. He has directed for five seasons at Oregon Shakespeare Festival (Handler, Hedda Gabler, The Comedy of Errors, By the Waters of Babylon, The Two Gentlemen of Verona) as well as at South Coast Repertory, the Mark Taper Forum, Yale Repertory Theatre, Guthrie Theatre, Lincoln Center Theatre, Arena Stage and many others. He has taught at UCLA, USC, California State University - Los Angeles, and is presently the Claire Trevor Professor of Drama at the University of California Irvine. He is currently co-directing The Falls (world premiere by Jeffrey Hatcher) at the Guthrie Theatre and will direct the New York premiere of Sarah Ruhl's The Clean House at Lincoln Center Theater, opening October 2006 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater.
The company is delighted to welcome Rauch to OSF. Rauch, 43, is the organization's fifth artistic director in its 71 year history. OSF founder Angus Bowmer was producing director/artistic director from 1935-1970. Jerry Turner was appointed producing director in 1971 and became artistic director in 1981 (name change only), retiring in 1991. Henry Woronicz was appointed and served until he resigned in 1995, and Appel was hired in 1995.
Outgoing artistic director Appel is confident that he will follow in Bowmer's tradition as a great artist and communicator. "Since Bill has been a guest artist at OSF for the past five years, and will direct Romeo and Juliet in 2007, we have had the good fortune to know his brilliant and creative mind," she said. "I have absolutely no doubt that he will bring his innovative vision, widening the playbill with classical plays from around the world as well as commissioning extraordinary playwrights with whom he has worked. I am confident and excited about the future because it will rest in Bill's sensitive and imaginative hands."
Executive Director Paul Nicholson echoes this confidence in Rauch's leadership. "Bill is an extraordinary leader in the world of American theatre, with a national reputation as a great theatre artist," Nicholson said. "He is an inspiring artistic director with a huge network of actors, directors, designers and playwrights throughout the country. He is unquestionably the person I want to work with in leading the Oregon Shakespeare Festival after Libby retires. I am simply delighted that he is going to join us and help shape OSF's future. I believe we will look back on this day and recognize it as among the most momentous in the history of the Festival."
Nancy Tait, President of Oregon Shakespeare Festival Board of Directors said, "On behalf of the Search Committee and Board of Directors, I am pleased to say Bill Rauch's appointment was made by a unanimous vote. After a very thorough search process, which brought to Ashland many of the most accomplished and talented theatre leaders in the nation, the committee, made up of Company and Board members, agreed Bill was the right choice to lead OSF toward its artistic future. Among his standout qualifications and qualities are his commitment to the highest level of artistic excellence; his passion for classical theater, anchored in the works of Shakespeare; his deep interest in new works; his strong, yet collaborative leadership style; and his understanding of the importance of community."
A welcome reception is planned for Rauch when he returns from directing in New York City.
More information about Rauch, as well as his answers to several questions about his new position and vision for OSF's future, is now posted here.