Live events slated for summer taking form
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. » Predicting the summer performance season is like being certain what the next day’s weather in March will be like. It’s fraught with uncertainty.
The most we can be certain of is improvement is in the future.
It appears, as we approach April, the general theme for the summer is fewer shows and longer runs. Too, almost everything will be outdoors, which means performance venues are the key to how live performances will take place.
In all likelihood, the procedures that permit live theater to take place will be the same for music concerts.
The operative tactics are outside performances, controlled audience capacity (smaller), and stringent COVID protocols.
Saratoga Performing Arts Center recently announced that the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center season will be held outdoors at Pitney Meadows Community Farm on Sundays June 13-August 29. Performances, offered twice daily will be 90-minutes, without an intermission.
It’s reasonable to expect that other groups will follow this pattern.
Indeed, Opera Saratoga which usually performs a concentrated season at SPAC’S Little Theater in late-June to early July, is also going outdoors at spaces to be identified in April. The season will consist of two staged operas, plus a number of concerts and special events. The season starts off June 19, with a new – hoped to be annual event – Juneteenth.
It continues through July 18. The titles and performance dates of other productions will be announced shortly.
Shakespeare & Company built a new 500 seat amphitheater (The New Spruce Theater) on the Lenox, MA, campus. It also has a smaller outside space, The Roman Garden, that can be utilized as well.
To date, the only major production announced is “King Lear,” starring Christopher Lloyd. It will be offered July 2-August 29. Limited runs that have been announced are “Becoming Othello: A Black Girl’s Journey” (July 16-July 23), and a workshop production of “Measure for Measure” (September 1 -5).
Chester Theatre Company, a prestigious theater company in Chester, MA, is performing a three-play season in a newly created outdoor space under a tent at Hancock Shaker Village.
Glimmerglass Opera is offering a season titled “Glimmerglass on the Grass” at a new space built on their Cooperstown property.
The only company with plans to perform indoors is Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield, MA. They intend to have a season in their 500-seat plus mainstage which has been
redesigned for maximum safety using less than 200 seats to ensure social distancing. Expect a season of small cast plays and musical revues instead of major productions.
They are also examining a couple of possible outdoor, under a tent performances.
Williamstown Theatre Festival has not announced summer plans, but the model they are likely to use is to offer a single, outdoor production in each of June, July and August. It will be outdoors and site specific for each production.
Berkshire Theatre Group is announcing a summer season shortly. It most likely will take place at the same site in Pittsfield, MA. where they offered “Godspell” last year. The smaller outside space on the Stockbridge, MA campus should also be the site for more intimate work.
Whatever does happen, it will be complicated. Despite the expectations that a large percentage of the population will be vaccinated, COVID protocols will continue to stay in effect. Audiences will be assigned specific areas in which to sit; when outside those areas, masks will be mandated. Temperature taking, and contact listings will continue.
Some organizations are struggling on how to control masses of people entering and leaving performances at the same time.
Park Playhouse, who intends to produce two plays at Washington Park in Albany will still offer free lawn seating to performances, but in order to control what will certainly be limited audience capacity, advanced reservations will be mandatory – even for free seating.
Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown, announced an ambitious, but abbreviated, season of scaled-down 90-minute productions, without intermissions, running from July 15-Aug 17.
They have a new outdoor space that will consist of defined areas for groups of 1-4 people, boxes for 1-6 people or tables for 1-6 people. For attendees, they will require a negative COVID test taken no less than 72 hours prior to the show, or proof of vaccination.
Because federal and state regulations on the size of gatherings change regularly, nothing in March is certain for the summer. However, it is reasonable to expect there will be live entertainment available this summer.