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Arts &
ENTERTAINMENT
Shakespeare’s Most Popular Comedy in Portland
Portland Center
Stage presents
A Midsummer
Night’s Dream
Portland Center Stage presents the final
play of their 2022-23 season by one of the
world’s most renowned playwrights: di-
rected by Artistic Director Marissa Wolf,
William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer
Night’s Dream opened on June 9 and runs
through July 2 on the mainstage. When
four young lovers escape their oppres-
sive society and seek refuge in the fairies’
woods on a midsummer night, mayhem
ensues! Tickets are on sale now, including
sliding scale tickets for BIPOC affinity
night, a.k.a. The People’s Party, on Friday,
June 30, at 7:30 p.m.
When Hermia refuses to let oppressive
Athenian law keep her from happiness, she
and her true love Lysander rush off to elope.
Helena, hoping to catch the attention of
Hermia’s discarded prospect, tells Deme-
: L-R: Nicole Marie Green, Andrés Alcalá, Lauren Bloom Hanover, and Treasure
Lunan in "A Midsummer Night's Dream": photo by Shawnte Sims/ courtesy of
Portland Center Stage.
trius about Hermia’s plan, and all four lov-
ers escape to the enchanted woods. There,
they cross paths with a bumbling band of
theater makers, fiendish fairies with a pen-
chant for magic revenge spells, and several
mistaken love matches. Will the games at
hand offer an escape from their repressed
existence, or will desire and a youthful vi-
sion for the future win, allowing their wild-
est dreams to become permanent?
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"Midsummer feels so brightly alive to
me right now, bringing both a wellspring
of deep love and joy that courses through
the play, as well as a rich social reso-
nance,” offers Artistic Director Marissa
Wolf. “We journey from the oppressive
society of Athens, which seeks to legis-
late over people's lives and bodies, to the
forest, where dreaming, desire, and may-
hem abound. With this incredible team of
actors and designers, I'm excited to invite
audiences into a space of rocking humor,
tenderness, and pleasure!"
Marissa is joined in her pursuit of mer-
riment by some of Portland’s best and
brightest creatives, including Peter Ksand-
er, designing the spellbound forest locale,
Sarita Fellows creating the costumes, Carl
Faber on lighting design, and Luke Norby
& Five OHM building the soundscape for
the play. On stage, PCS favorites return:
Andrés Alcalá, Lauren Bloom-Hanover,
Nicole Marie Green, Tyler Andrew Jones,
Jennifer Lanier, Treasure Lunan, Andy
Perkins, Jesse Weil, and Ken Yoshikawa.
As The New York Times states, “There
is, of course, no such thing as a foolproof
play, but A Midsummer Night's Dream
comes about as close as anything written
in the last 400 years.”