New York Shakespeare Festival - Sponsorship of Other Theatres

Sponsorship of Other Theatres

Over the years, the New York Shakespeare Festival supported other theatre companies throughout New York, helping to foster the growth of Off Broadway, as well as specific theatre programs and projects. Among these companies that benefited from NYSF during critical periods of their development was the Theatre for a New Audience. The Theatre for a New Audience developed a number of productions sponsored by the NYSF, including A Midsummer Nights Dream, presented at the Ansbacher Theatre, and through this sponsorship, the company was able to grow and expand its outreach to new audiences. Another such company was the Riverside Shakespeare Company. The Festival, under Papp's leadership, sponsored several Riverside Shakespeare Company productions at a critical stage in its development, beginning with Riverside's New York premiere production of Brecht's Edward II in 1982 at The Shakespeare Center on the Upper West Side (dedicated by Joseph Papp in 1982), followed by Equity parks tours of free Shakespeare throughout the five borroughs of New York City - much as the NYSF had done for years before. Riverside Shakespeare Company summer parks tour of Free Shakespeare sponsored by the NYSF began with A Comedy of Errors in 1982, followed by The Merry Wives of Windsor, featuring Anna Deavere Smith in her New York stage debut as Mistress Quickly, Romeo and Juliet, and The Taming of the Shrew. During the NYSF period of support, the Riverside Shakespeare Company expanded greatly, offering for the first time The Shakespeare Project in 1983, and serving a wide range of audiences in the five borroughs.

Most of this kind of developmental support by the NYSF came under the initiation of Joseph Papp - as part of his commitment to foster the development of theater in New York, from revenues derived from successful NYSF productions, such as the Broadway production of A Chorus Line, which had been developed at the NYSF and transferred to Broadway for the longest run of a Broadway musical up till then.