Toledo Talk "Free Shakespeare at Ottawa Park" id 4215

Bill Quinlan, the founding producer of Harvest Theatre of Toledo, said he was looking for a place to rehearse when someone told him about the Ottawa Park amphitheater. "I saw this beautiful, big space, and I thought it sure would be fun to do something out here," he said.

With a background in New York theater, he was very familiar with that city's Shakespeare in the Park series, so he decided to see how Toledo would respond to a similar event. The result is The Taming of the Shrew, William Shakespeare's comedy about Katherina, a wasp-tongued beauty, who is married off by her father to Petruchio, who seeks a wealthy wife.

Sidenote: I've seen Harvest Theatre productions at the Collingwood Arts Center and at a church in the Old West End. They are looking for a permanent home, so if you have a building that's not doing anything, contact HT. From the Harvest Theatre Web site:

The Harvest Theatre of Toledo is currently seeking a permanent venue that we can call "home" for future seasons. If you have any ideas or thoughts on this, please give Producing Director, Bill Quinlan a call (419) 902-0608, or drop him an email at bq@harvesttheatre.com

Ideally, we are looking for a space which is affordable to a not-for-profit group to rent on a "per show" basis (or monthly if the rent is really cheap!) and seat approximately 100-150 people comfortably in an audience friendly area. It doesn't necessarily have to be a theatre per se, but even a "found" space where we would have some flexibility in creativity would be wonderful!

We are considering working with another local theatre that is also looking for a home base, so there is a good chance that the site could be busy most of the year.

Any suggestion would be tremendously helpful!