UNH Premiers Shakespeare’s The Tempest Sept. 2-3

The UNH Department of Theatre and Dance in association with The Bell Center For Music and The Arts is pleased to announce The Tempest by William Shakespeare showing Sept. 2-3 at The Bell Center for Music and The Arts in Dover.

David Richman, professor of theatre, plays the central role of Prospero and will lead a cast of 12 UNH students in this magical production. Director David Kaye will first mount the play for a single performance on Appledore Island in August before bringing the production to The Bell Center. 

“It’s such a wonderful play about transformation. A perfect way to mark the transition from summer to fall,” Kaye says.
 
Shakespeare’s last great play is set on a remote, unexplored island. The fury of the elements, as well as the even greater fury of human perfidy and deceit, has cast upon this island an unforgettable crew of young lovers, querulous lords, monsters, sprites, and one very angry magician. Coming to terms with each other, as well as with this harsh and magical environment, all these creatures find their true selves as they learn something about what it means to be human. Shakespeare probes as deeply as anyone ever has into the heart’s mysteries. He may also be bidding farewell to the theatre to which he has devoted his creative life.
 
David Kaye, professor of acting, directing and playwriting, has served on the faculty since 1996. He has worked professionally for companies throughout the United States as a director, actor, and designer. He directed the Bell Center’s 2004 world premiere of The Tooth Fairy's Daughter at the Rochester Opera House. He has been the artistic director of Maine’s Sanford Maine Stage, Hackmatack Playhouse and New York City’s Julian Acting Company. He is a produced and published playwright. His screenplay Can't Get There was broadcast by PBS, his play Rump! won the 1998 Anna Zornio Memorial Children’s Theater Playwriting Award, and his experimental comedy, And God Said (!@#&!), was a top 10 pick at the 2001 Montreal Fringe Festival.
 
David Richman received his bachelor's degree from Harvard and his Ph.D. from Stanford. Since 1988, he has served on the faculty for the Department of Theatre and Dance. He teaches courses in the interpretation of Shakespeare, play reading, and the history, theory, and criticism of theatre, as well as courses for the humanities program. He has directed UNH students in more than 30 plays by playwrights such as Shakespeare, Ibsen, Beckett, and other classical and modern dramatists. Most recently, he directed Shaw's Arms and The Man, and Seamus Heaney's The Cure At Troy. He has written books about Shakespearean comedies and W.B. Yeats' plays, as well as an assortment of articles on Shakespeare and other famous playwrights. He is a recipient of the Lindberg Award, given to the outstanding teacher-scholar in the College of Liberal Arts.

For tickets, and for additional information, contact The Bell Center box office at 742-BELL.