AS YOU LIKE IT to Woo Audiences at Northwestern University This Fall

An uplifting and open-hearted contemporary production of a classic Shakespeare comedy filled with music, song and dance is part of the fall Mainstage season at Northwestern University. Letting go and opening your heart are at the center of this modern takeoff, in which violence and isolation give way to love, communion, and oh so much more.

Shakespeare's AS YOU LIKE IT will be staged from Nov. 20 to 22 and from Dec. 3 to 6, at Northwestern's Ethel M. Barber Theater, 30 Arts Circle Drive, on the University's Evanston campus.

Presented by the University's Virginia Wadsworth Wirtz Center for the Performing Arts, the production will be staged by Risher Reddick, a School of Communication MFA directing candidate and feature a Northwestern student cast. (Information on the Master of Fine Arts in Directing Program is available online.)

Shakespeare's classic tale also asks an important question: Is it too late to set conditions after you've fallen in love?

AS YOU LIKE IT follows Rosalind, a young woman who falls in love and is soon banished from court by her uncle, the Duke, to the Forest of Arden. Disguising herself as a man to ensure the safety of her journey, Rosalind encounters her would-be husband, Orlando, in the forest and puts him to the test, discovering more about him and herself in the process.

Performances will take place at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Nov. 20; 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 21; 2 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 22; 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 3; 7:30 p.m. Friday, Dec. 4; 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 5; and 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 6, at the Barber Theater.

Tickets are $25 for general public; $22 for Northwestern staff and faculty, educators and seniors 62 and older; and $10 for full-time students with valid IDs (at the door) or $5 tickets exclusively for full-time Northwestern students on advance purchase only. Discounts are available for groups of eight or more. For more information, phone 847-491-4819, visit the Wirtz Center website or email the Wirtz Center.