Door Shakespeare Offers Scenes From KING LEAR, A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM, AND RICHARD III for NEA Big Read: Door County

On February 12, 2021, Door Shakespeare brings together an eclectic ensemble of nine artists to share excerpts from three plays by William Shakespeare that are featured in Emily St. John Mandel's Station Eleven as part of the 2021 NEA Big Read: Door County, running through February 13.

The Door Shakespeare February 12, 2021, 7:00 live Zoom offering, Selections from King Lear, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Richard III, is free. To view the complete list of events associated with the 2021 NEA Big Read: Door County, please visit the Door County Reads calendar. More information can be found online (doorshakespeare.com or doorcountyreads.org) or by calling 920.854.7111.

Door Shakespeare, Producing Artistic Director Michael Stebbins, and Managing Director Amy Ensign, are proud to participate in the 2021 NEA Big Read: Door County, a program of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest.
This is the fifteenth year that Door County has participated in the NEA Big Read. This year's book of choice is Emily St. John Mandel's Station Eleven, which "is set in a post-apocalyptic North America, twenty years after the initial collapse of civilization when culture is reshaping itself and defining a new normal." (doorcountyreads website) Door Shakespeare is participating in the variety of virtual programming with Selections from King Lear, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Richard III on February 12 at 7:00.

"Station Eleven is an amazing novel. In a world left bereft of so many things after a devastating flu pandemic swept through the world," says Door Shakespeare Producing Artistic Director, Michael Stebbins, "the fact that art survives in the form of music and theatre, and drives a band of individuals forward in a time of desolate existence, speaks to the power of the musical note and the written word - specifically William Shakespeare. That the book was chosen as the 2021 offering prior to our current pandemic, makes the story and journey all the more powerful."

Scenes from, and references to, William Shakespeare and his plays weave their way through Emily St. John Mandel's Station Eleven. Door Shakespeare will share selections from these plays and discuss how their themes and parallels reverberate through Station Eleven. Door Shakespeare brings together an ensemble of nine actors to bring these scenes to life.

The evening offering is directed by Charles Fraser and features the talents of Sadé Ayodele, James Carrington, Isabelle Dippel, Ross Dippel, Amy Ensign, Heidi Hodges, Donna Johnson, Mark Moede, and Ryan Zierk.

James Carrington returns to Door Shakespeare for his fifth year, having appeared in their 2016, 2018 and 2019 summer seasons and most recently in their 2020 virtual production of The Comedy of Errors.

Amy Ensign, Door Shakespeare's Managing Director, appeared on the outdoor stage as Mistress Page in 2019's The Merry Wives of Windsor, and most recently in J. M. Barrie's Shakespeare's Legacy, part of the 2020 Door Shakespeare (Virtual) Reading Series. Amy's Door County credits include work with Peninsula Players, Northern Sky, Theatre M, Teatro Carravagio, Third Avenue Playhouse, and nine seasons at Door Shakespeare. When not at Door Shakespeare, Amy enjoys working as the theatre director for Sevastopol School.

Charles Fraser made his Door Shakespeare debut in 2020's virtual production of The Comedy of Errors. He has been an actor in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, for over 25 years, where he has performed with the Guthrie Theater, Park Square Theatre, History Theatre, Jungle Theater, Zephyr Theatre, Yellow Tree Theatre, Ordway Center for the Performing Arts, Mixed Blood Theatre, Playwrights' Center, Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Minnesota Shakespeare Project, and Illusion Theatre, among others.

Heidi Hodges has orbited theater her entire life. Once in Door County, she hung out with the Heritage Ensemble (now Northern Sky Theater), working a few seasons as Box Office Manager. She worked for the Door County Advocate and continues a weekly column (hasn't missed an issue since 1998, a streak longer than Brett Favre's.) She's currently the editor of the Washington Island Observer, co-owns the Door Kewaunee Arts Guidebook and runs her own photography and writing business, and does volunteer photo work for Door Shakespeare.

Making her Door Shakespeare debut, Donna Johnson had her start in community theater shortly after moving to Door County. She has been in productions at Rogue Theater, Isadoora Theater, Theater M, and has participated in Third Avenue Playhouse's Winter Play Reading Festival for three years.

Mark Moede has performed for more than 45 years in a variety of states, countries, languages, and genres. Twenty five plus years of these performances include the Door Peninsula, beginning with Theatre M, which Mark and his wife Mary White founded in 1991. Some of his recent work in Door County includes Door Shakespeare's The Complete Works of William Shakespeare [Abridged], Pride and Prejudice, Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, Northern Sky's (then AFT) Life on the Mississippi, Spitfire Grill, Theatre M's Talking Heads, The Revival of Billy Sunday, TAP's Tuesdays with Morrie and The Subject Was Roses, And Peninsula Players' Then There Were None, The Hollow, and The Full Monty.

Ryan Zierk is a Milwaukee based actor who earned his Bachelor of Arts at the University of Wisconsin Parkside. He performed with Door Shakespeare in the summer of 2018, and was part of the Door Shakespeare Reading Series in 2019. In the summer of 2019 he toured Wisconsin, traveling to eighteen state parks, with the Summit Players, a traveling Milwaukee-based Shakespeare company, playing Romeo in Romeo and Juliet.

"We are so pleased to be a part of the 2021 NEA Big Read: Door County," shares Door Shakespeare Managing Director Amy Ensign. "My two favorite things in the world are taking in a show and reading a good book. That we can do both of these things together as a community, especially at a time when we have not been able to connect with each other, is a real treat. Please join us!"

Door Shakespeare was founded in 1995 under the umbrella of the then-named American Folklore Theatre. Since becoming its own nonprofit in 1999, the organization has produced 40 striking productions of classical theater by playwrights including Shakespeare, Moliere, and Oscar Wilde in the Garden of Björklunden's 405-acre estate on Lake Michigan in Baileys Harbor.

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