Chuck Schumer Announces Legislation to Fund New Home for Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer has just revealed he has just secured a $1.5 million boost in federal funding in pending legislation to complete the expansion of the long sought new open-air Shakespeare style amphitheater for Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival (HVSF) in Garrison, overlooking the Hudson River.

Schumer said this is one of the final pieces of the puzzle needed to complete this project to create a permanent home for the HVSF that brings tens of thousands of visitors every year, is one of the area’s largest employers, provides educational programing to students, and spurs millions for businesses along our Main Streets and in the Putnam County and Hudson Valley economy.

“For too long this long-desired project to create a permanent home for the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival and beautiful new theater overlooking the scenic Hudson River faced a question: ‘To be or not to be?’ Well I am here today to announce that I have just secured funding to say it is to be! The $1.5 million I just secured in the Senate appropriations bill is how we can ensure this project quickly moves forward and breaks ground so that the show can go on for this beloved Putnam County tradition bigger and better than ever before,” said Senator Schumer.

“Tens of thousands of theater lovers every year come to the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, pumping millions into our shops, restaurants and the Hudson Valley economy. I helped save the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival during the pandemic with my Save Our Stages Act because I know how important the arts and live theater are to this community, and I won’t stop fighting to deliver this $1.5 million in the final FY 2025 Ag-FDA appropriations bill. Today, we take a major step forward to turning this ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’ into a reality for the Hudson Valley.”

Founded in 1987, Schumer explained that the HVSF, a designated nonprofit, has presented repertory theatre under its iconic open-air Theater Tent each summer for over 30,000 audience members, while also reaching over 30,000 students, families, and educators in schools and communities throughout the Hudson Valley. The critically-acclaimed theater has been highlighted for its productions by the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the New Yorker. On top of the annual HVSF audience of over 30,000 supporting local small businesses as they go out to dinner and shop along Main Street, the HVSF is one of the largest employers in western Putnam County. The HVSF's 100-person seasonal staff of directors, designers, actors, technicians, ushers, concessionaires, and more, consists of local and national union talent. These staff members live, work, and play in the community during the summer season leaving a significant impact on local small businesses. The expansion is expected to create dozens of new good-paying construction and permanent production jobs.

For years, the HVSF has hosted at the iconic open-air Theater Tent and was gifted a 98-acre property, formerly a golf course, in Philipstown to build a permanent home in 2019. The organization has been working nonstop to raise funds for the construction of an open-air Shakespeare style amphitheater. Once completed, the new facility will be fully open to the public, offering more than 98 acres of ecologically restored native greenspace for recreation and additional spaces for local use such as blood drives, community meetings, and farmers markets. In addition, the new project will enable the HVSF to expand its programming and offerings for new productions that were inhibited by the limitations of the existing space. The avant-garde theater will be the first purpose-built LEED Platinum certified theater in the country and was developed for the Hudson Valley by the architectural firm Studio Gang, who has designed worldwide renowned projects such as the Richard Gilder Center at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, the Tour Montparnasse in Paris, France, and the new O’Hare Airport Global Terminal in Chicago, Illinois.