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• Summer theater festival preview

As the weather warms, and we look for relative bargains for summer entertainment, here is a look at the classics as performed in the various summer theater festivals. Each of these is a day to two days driving away and worth every mile of it.

Only 50 some miles to the northwest is the Illinois Shakespeare Festival at Ewing Manor in Bloomington. This year, “The Three Musketeers” comes to the stage, and the Bard gets three with “The Tempest,” “The Merry Wives of Windsor” and a special version of “As You Like It” for young audiences. The season runs from June 24 to August 8, and for further details, check out: www.thefestival.org. The box office can be reached directly at: 309-438-2535.

Roughly six hours to the north, and west of Madison, Wisconsin in Spring Green is the American Players Theatre. From June 5 to October 17, you can enjoy classics of the stage that span four hundred years in both indoor and outdoor venues. From four centuries ago, APT will present Shakespeare’s “As You Like It” and “All’s Well That Ends Well.” From the early part of the 20th century, W. Somerset Maugham’s “The Circle” and George Bernard Shaw’s “Major Barbara” will introduce audiences to a very different take on British society. Lillian Hellman’s “Another Part of the Forest” and Samuel

Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot” will give you two very different takes on life from the middle of the century.

Pamela Gien (“The Syringa Tree”) and Athol Fugard (“Exits and Entrances”) look at life in apartheid-era South Africa, giving APT an even broader reach in its repertoire. Located in the Wisconsin river valley in the heart of Frank Lloyd Wright country, its full breadth can be examined at: www.americanplayers.org. You contact their box office directly at: 608-588-2361.

Located in Stratford, Ontario, Canada’s Stratford Festival has the works of Shakespeare as it anchor, but there is a great deal more there during a season that runs from April to the end of October. “As You LIke It,” “The Winter’s Tale,” “Two Gentlemen of Verona” and “The Tempest” are the Elizabethan foundation of this season. But, if your tastes run towards musicals, you can choose from “Kiss Me Kate,” “Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris” and “Evita.” There are interesting small venue productions in the Studio Theater that are always worth checking out and for the whole family — ”Peter Pan” with no music, yes, the original Sir James Barrie script. The big picture is at: www.stratfordfestival.ca, and you can reach their box office directly at: 800-567-1600. Stratford is about ten hours from Champaign county.

Three hours to the east from Stratford in the Niagara region is The Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake. This is the only theater festival dedicated to the works of George Bernard Shaw. Bernard Shaw will be represented on their stages with “The Doctor’s Dilemma” and a production of “John Bull’s Other Island” directed by University of Illinois graduate, Christopher Newton. The musical, “One Touch of Venus” will represent a rarely heard musical from Shaw’s lifetime. Look also for Tom Murphy’s new translation of Chekhov’s “The Cherry Orchard” and the wrongly neglected “The Women” by Clare Booth Luce will have its day on stage. “Harvey” will be a great choice for families, and fans of Oscar Wilde can catch “An Ideal Husband.” Barrie also appears here in the lunchtime theater with a one act play called “Half an Hour” without Peter Pan.

The Shaw Festival is currently running and final shows will not close until the end of October. Check out: www.shawfest.com, or call — 800-511-7429 (Shaw). Visitors to Canada must have passports.