Stratford Festival shows to see this summer

You don’t need to like Shakespeare to enjoy the Stratford Festival. Yes, this season includes a trio of plays from the Bard, whose works form the cornerstone of this repertory theatre company. But the festival’s lineup also features other productions, including modern classics, world premieres and a musical in which Shakespeare is the egotistical villain. There are a dozen mainstage shows playing across four theatres in Stratford this season, which runs through mid-November. Here’s a comprehensive guide to all the productions that have already opened and those on the horizon.
After a year away, Canadian director and choreographer Donna Feore is back at the Stratford Festival to lead “Something Rotten!” the uproarious musical comedy that follows two brothers and aspiring writers who are willing to do almost anything to usurp William Shakespeare, the cocky superstar playwright who’s the talk of London. After an erratic soothsayer predicts that musicals will be theatre’s next big thing, the Bottom bros turn their sights on creating the world’s first singing and dancing extravaganza. Starring Mark Uhre, Henry Firmston and Dan Chameroy, Feore’s production pulls out all the stops — and even features a bevy of Easter eggs hearkening back to her previous iconic musicals. Runs until Nov. 17 at the Festival Theatre 
Director Sam White’s new staging of “Romeo and Juliet” — the 13th production of this romantic tragedy in Stratford’s history — may be the most violent yet. In her version of Verona, the town square hisses with the sound of warring swords that split the air, undercut by the unrelenting beat of a pulsing drum. The central idea of White’s production is how this primal violence can be juxtaposed by primal beauty: that of the love between the play’s two star-crossed protagonists. The couple is played here by rising star Jonathan Mason and Broadway’s Vanessa Sears, who are joined by Scott Wentworth as Friar Laurence and Andrew Iles as Romeo’s best friend, Mercutio. Runs until Oct. 26 at the Festival Theatre 
Playwright Andrea Scott was inspired to write this new family drama after watching the Stratford Festival production of Eugene O’Neill’s “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” in 2018. Set in Toronto’s Little Jamaica neighbourhood, “Get That Hope” follows a dysfunctional family over the course of one sweltering August day. This world premiere production is directed by André Sills and stars Celia Aloma, who plays a daughter fighting for her freedom. Runs until Sept. 28 at the Studio Theatre 
This late-career, taboo-prodding play by American dramatist Edward Albee took the theatre world by storm when it premiered in 2002. The absurdist and provocative work follows a successful architect whose bombshell revelation that he’s fallen in love with a goat comes to destroy his family. In it, Albee explores themes of social morality and sexual taboos. This new production at the Stratford Festival, directed by Dean Gabourie, stars Lucy Peacock and Rick Roberts. Runs until Sept. 29 at the Studio Theatre
As a performer, Seana McKenna has spent decades treading the boards of the Stratford Festival. This year, however, she’s stepped back to direct the company’s headlining Shakespeare production of “Twelfth Night.” It’s a play she knows well, having played both Viola and Olivia in previous iterations of the romantic comedy. In her new staging, McKenna transposes the action to the 1960s, on the eve of the Summer of Love. Her production also changes the genders of several characters: here, Malvolio is a woman, played by Laura Condlln, while Olivia’s fool, Feste, is portrayed by Deborah Hay. Runs until Oct. 26 at the Festival Theatre 
Based on the hit French play of the same name, Harvey Fierstein and Jerry Herman’s “La Cage aux Folles” is a celebration of pride and acceptance. The 1983 feel-good musical follows a gay couple who run an aging Saint-Tropez nightclub. Their peaceful lives are interrupted when their heterosexual son, Jean-Michel, brings home a charming woman whose father just happens to be the deputy leader of the ultra-conservative Tradition, Family and Morality Party. Directed by Thom Allison, who last year helmed “Rent,” the production stars Sean Arbuckle as Georges and Steve Ross in a career-defining performance as Albin, who sings the iconic anthem “I Am What I Am.” Runs until Nov. 16 at the Avon Theatre
“Cymbeline” is one of the Bard’s most fascinating so-called “problem plays.” The rarely produced work, now running at the Tom Patterson Theatre, defies categorization. In fact, you could describe it as Shakespeare’s late-career mixtape, blending elements of his comedies, tragedies and romances. The dense plot follows a young princess who’s caught in a messy love triangle amid the Roman invasion of Britain. Director Esther Jun’s magical production stars Allison Edwards-Crewe as the heroine Innogen and Lucy Peacock in the gender-bent title role as her mother. Runs until Sept. 28 at the Tom Patterson Theatre 
The titular heroine of Henrik Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler” is often described as the female Hamlet. Psychologically tormented by a loveless marriage and living in a society in which she does not belong, Hedda is one of the greatest roles in the theatrical canon. In director Molly Atkinson’s production, which uses a new streamlined adaptation of the text by Patrick Marber, she’s played by Canadian actor Sara Topham, returning to the festival following a recent Broadway bow in Tom Stoppard’s “Leopoldstadt.” She’s joined by Brad Hodder, playing her husband Lovborg, and Tom McCamus, as the cunning Judge Brack. Runs until Sept. 28 at the Tom Patterson Theatre
J.M. Barrie’s classic story has been newly adapted for the stage — with a few surprising twists. For one, there’s a fourth Darling child, whose untimely death plunges the family into mourning and sends the remaining children to Neverland in search of their brother. This North American premiere, directed by Thomas Morgan Jones, is one of the last productions originally programmed for the 2020 season that is finally being realized on the stage. It stars Cynthia Jimenez-Hicks as Wendy, Jake Runeckles as Peter Pan and Laura Condlln as Captain Hook. Runs until Oct. 27 at the Avon Theatre
This groundbreaking new Canadian play recounts the long-forgotten Beijing production of “Death of a Salesman” in 1983. Coming less than a decade after the Cultural Revolution in China, the run marked the first time that Arthur Miller’s tragedy was presented in Mandarin, with the American playwright himself directing this Chinese premiere. Tom McCamus stars as Miller opposite Singaporean actor Adrian Pang as Ying Ruocheng, the Chinese theatremaker whose idea it was to bring the play to China. Leanna Brodie and Jovanni Sy’s play is fully bilingual, featuring English and Mandarin translations. Runs until Oct. 26 at the Avon Theatre
Stratford Festival artistic director Antoni Cimolino helms this classic comedy by Irish playwright Dion Boucicault, who skewers the upper class in a satire filled with puns, slapstick and innuendo. The farce follows the hapless Sir Harcourt Courtly, an over-the-hill fop whose plan to marry his 18-year-old bride is thwarted by his son and the jocular huntress Lady Gay Spanker. Geraint Wyn Davies stars in this production opposite Deborah Hay. Runs until Oct. 25 at the Festival Theatre
This new stage adaptation of “The Diviners” comes exactly half a century after Canadian author Margaret Laurence published her seminal novel, about the writer Morag Gunn, who’s forced to confront a sea of old memories as she pens her latest book and re-evaluates her relationships with family, friends and former lovers. Vern Thiessen and Yvette Nolan’s play is directed by Krista Jackson with Geneviève Pelletier, in a production that leverages song and dance. Runs until Oct. 2 at the Tom Patterson Theatre