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ANNOUNCES
2027 40TH ANNIVERSARY SEASON FEATURING WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S
A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM DIRECTED BY RYAN QUINN
JUNE 2 – SEPTEMBER 25
THE CHERRY TORTURED A NEW PLAY BY AARON POSNER
BASED ON AN OLD PLAY BY ANTON CHEKHOV DIRECTED BY DAVIS MCCALLUM
JUNE 4 – JULY 31
SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE MUSIC AND LYRICS BY STEPHEN SONDHEIM
BOOK BY JAMES LAPINE
DIRECTED BY AMANDA DEHNERT
JUNE 6 – SEPTEMBER 4 AND
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S
MACBETH
DIRECTED BY JENN THOMPSON
AUGUST 7 – OCTOBER 3
AT THE SAMUEL H. SCRIPPS THEATER CENTER (October 14, 2026 – New York) Hudson Valley Shakespeare (HVS) (Davis McCallum, Artistic Director; Kendra Ekelund, Managing Director) announced its 2027 40th Anniversary Season, which will run June 2 – October 3, 2027 at Hudson Valley Shakespeare’s Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center (2015 Route 9, Garrison, NY 10524). Following a record-breaking season that welcomed more than 35,000 audience members this summer to sold-out performances, Hudson Valley Shakespeare’s 40th anniversary season will include William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, directed by Ryan Quinn (HVS’s The Comedy of Errors); The Cherry Tortured by Aaron Posner (Stupid Fucking Bird, Life Sucks) and directed by Artistic Director Davis McCallum (HVS’s King Lear); Sunday in the Park with George, with Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and Book by James Lapine, directed by Amanda Dehnert (HVS’s Octet); and Shakespeare’s Macbeth, directed by Jenn Thompson (HVS’s Les Misérables). Artistic Director Davis McCallum said, “As we look ahead to our 40th anniversary season, it feels both like a homecoming and a bold step into the future. From the enchanted forest of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, where Hudson Valley Shakespeare’s story began four decades ago, to the ominous shadows of Birnam Wood, these plays explore the wild terrain of human desire, and the supernatural forces stirring within the natural world. They are big, gloriously human stories, brought to life by an extraordinary ensemble of artists and an audience willing to come along for the ride. Forty years on, our belief in the alchemy of live theater remains unchanged, but the possibilities of what we can create together have never felt more exciting.” HVS’s student matinee series invites students to the Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center located in Garrison, NY for world-class performance and discovery. Between September 15 and October 1, HVS will offer eight morning performances of the mainstage productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Macbeth. Tickets for students will be available at the subsidized rate of $15. Additional subsidies and student transportation reimbursements are available upon request, subject to availability. This extraordinary opportunity is made possible in large part by funding from the US Department of Education, to support on-site arts education experiences and programming. HVS is deeply grateful to Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand for their support for this program.
Full details about HVS’s 2027 season, including casting and ticket information, will be announced at a later date. Please note performance dates may be subject to change. MORE ON THE 2027 SEASON: William Shakespeare’s A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM Directed by Ryan Quinn June 2 – September 25 “The course of true love never did run smooth.” Forty years ago, Hudson Valley Shakespeare began with a dream. Now the magic returns as we revisit Shakespeare’s most enchanting, romantic comedy, and very first play we produced. As the longest day of the year gives way to a midsummer night, the boundaries between reality and fantasy begin to blur. Deep in an enchanted forest, four young lovers lose their way, a troupe of amateur actors stumbles into the supernatural, and a mischievous fairy named Puck turns love upside down. Under the spell of the fairy king and queen, Oberon and Titania, hearts are stolen, affections are misplaced, and nothing, or no one, is quite as they seem. Bursting with romance, laughter, and glorious mischief, A Midsummer Night's Dream is a joyful reminder that love is messy, maddening, and rarely follows the rules. But beneath the moonlight, the most wondrous transformations may await those brave enough to surrender to the unexpected. THE CHERRY TORTURED Or the Parable of the Great Unsticking A New Play by Aaron Posner Based on an Old Play by Anton Chekhov Directed by Davis McCallum June 4 – July 31 "We don’t need ways out. We need ways in. Further in… Further Into Life. That’s where we need to go." After five years away, Miss Lulu is coming home. The ancestral home she remembers is crumbling, but the family drama is right where she left it. As old grudges resurface, fresh calamities loom, and the future of their beloved family estate teeters on the brink of change, one question remains: how do you move forward when everything you love is on the line? By transporting the story from 19th-century Russia to today’s Hudson Valley, award-winning playwright Aaron Posner (Stupid Fucking Bird, Life Sucks) brings Chekhov’s final masterpiece, The Cherry Orchard, vividly into the present, preserving its complicated characters and emotional depth while infusing it with his signature wicked wit and irreverence. The result is a comedy as wonderfully cheeky as it is achingly moving, exploring what it means to hold on, let go, and find the courage to begin again. SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim Book by James Lapine
Directed by Amanda Dehnert June 6 – September 4 “Anything you do, let it come from you. Then it will be new.” Great art can capture a moment forever. But sometimes, in trying to create something that lasts, we lose sight of the people and moments that matter most. Inspired by Georges Seurat’s iconic painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, the story begins in 1880s Paris, with a young painter in pursuit of perfection to complete his masterpiece. As the figures in the park slowly come to life on his canvas, his obsessive drive to “finish the hat” threatens his relationship with Dot, the woman he loves. A century later, his great-grandson, struggling to find his own artistic voice, discovers that sometimes to create something new, he must first understand what came before. Art and landscape share the same frame in this new production of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Pulitzer Prize-winning musical. Set against the beauty of the Hudson Highlands, Sunday in the Park with George is a humorous and deeply human celebration of art, love, and the choices that shape our lives. With Sondheim’s soaring score and brilliantly perceptive lyrics, this is as much about the art of living as it is about the art of creating. Sunday in the Park with George was originally directed on Broadway by James Lapine, with Orchestrations by Michael Starobin, and originally Produced on Broadway by The Shubert Organization and Emanuel Azenberg by arrangement with Playwrights Horizon, Inc. New York City which produced the original production of Sunday in the Park with George in 1983. Sunday in the Park with George is presented through special arrangement with Music Theater International (MTI). All authorized performance materials are supplied by MTI. www.mtishows.com William Shakespeare’s MACBETH Directed by Jenn Thompson August 7 – October 3 “Stars, hide your fires; Let not light see my black and deep desires.” A prophecy. A promise of greatness. A crown within reach. When three witches foretell Macbeth's rise to the Scottish throne, ambition becomes obsession. Spurred on by his wife, he murders his king and claims the crown. But one act of betrayal unleashes a deadly chain of consequences. As guilt gives way to paranoia and suspicion turns to slaughter, Macbeth discovers that seizing control is one thing. Keeping it is another. Jenn Thompson (Les Misérables) returns to direct one of Shakespeare's best-known tragedies. Set against the dramatic landscape of the Hudson Highlands, this spine-tingling thriller crackles with supernatural intrigue as the seductive promise of power sends Macbeth careening towards his own undoing, plunging an entire kingdom into violence and chaos in his wake. ABOUT HUDSON VALLEY SHAKESPEARE
Located eighty minutes north of Manhattan, Hudson Valley Shakespeare (HVS) is a professional nonprofit theater company that presents a rotating repertory season of lucid and highly inventive productions of Shakespeare alongside contemporary plays or musicals in an open-air theater overlooking the Hudson River. Founded in 1987 and formerly known as the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, HVS’s critically acclaimed body of work is forged from the most essential of elements – actors, audience, language, and landscape. At the heart of this work is a resident company of actors who perform across multiple productions throughout the repertory season. In the summer of 2026, HVS opened its first-ever permanent home – the Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center, designed by the celebrated architecture firm Studio Gang—on a spectacular new 98-acre campus. Protected from the elements but open to the landscape, the Scripps Theater Center is on track to be the first purpose-built LEED Platinum theater in the United States. The company’s new home serves as a vibrant hub for the local community, a cultural and educational anchor for the region, and a national model for environmental sustainability in the performing arts. Rooted in the landscape of the Hudson Valley, with the plays of William Shakespeare as their touchstone, Hudson Valley Shakespeare engages the widest possible audience in a theatrical celebration of our shared humanity. FOR MORE INFORMATION: WWW.HVSHAKESPEARE.ORG #
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