A Shakespeare festival is born in Mamakating

BLOOMINGBURG, NY — In what is planned to be the first of many seasons of the Mamakating Shakespeare Festival, “Twelfth Night,” Shakespeare’s comedy of mistaken identity, gender-switching and frustrated romance, will be performed at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, July 30 and Sunday, July 31 in Mamakating Town Park on Mamakating Road.

The festival is an idea cooked up only five weeks ago by Mamakating Town Supervisor Charles Penna—formerly a worker in the Mamakating Highway Department for 28 years—with the able assistance of Ian MacMillan, a Mamakating resident with a 50-year résumé as actor, playwright and director who teaches acting professionally. With little time between the inception and execution of the idea, this year the play is being both acted and directed entirely by Piper Productions, a professional company. The hope is that next year will see a whole season of Mamakating Shakespeare in the Park, directed by MacMillan and with local talents fleshing out the Piper Productions troupe.

To further this goal, MacMillan—who made his stage debut at age 10 touring with Howard Keel in a production of “South Pacific”—is giving free acting classes to Mamakating teenagers with the intention of ensuring that they can perform as equals with members of the Piper Productions troupe by next summer. MacMillan seems to harbor no doubts of his ability to achieve his goal: “I make amateurs into professional level actors,” he said.

This summer, however, the only opportunity to see Mamakating’s Shakespeare in the Park will be this weekend. The performances are free, and blankets and picnics are encouraged.