The Shakespeare Festival at Tulane

Founded in 1993, The Shakespeare Festival at Tulane is professional theater company in residence at Tulane University. The Festival's dual mission is to educate and to entertain with a focus upon the works of William Shakespeare. Through an annual season of plays, arts-in-education outreach programming, and the training of students and teachers, The Shakesepare Festival at Tulane uses the works of Shakespeare to serve New Orleans and the south Gulf state region. Of equal importance to the Festival is its mission to educate. The Festival offers an Institute on Teaching Shakespeare called Shakespeare on the Road, which is a touring "informance" that includes excerpts from more than ten of Shakespeare’s plays and an annual professional production for the schools.  This is performed as a field trip opportunity for 3,000-5,000 middle- and high-school students. These performances are often the only opportunity these students have to see full-length, live professional theater. No other such program is available to students in Louisiana and schools return year after year.  As the Festival enters its twentieth season, the staff and board of directors take great pride in continuing to serve the community with this unique cultural resource.  

As part of Shakespeare for a New Generation, The Shakespeare Festival at Tulane will present Hamlet in January 2013, specifically for area middle- and high-school students. The production will be staged in the Dixon Hall Theatre on the campus of Tulane University. The support from Shakespeare for a New Generation will be utilized to allow the Festival to maintain an admission price of $10 per student and free admission and transportation reimbursement for 1,200 underserved public school students from 12 area schools to attend the play. To maximize the impact of the experience, students will have an opportunity to participate in a talkback with actors and the director following the performance. Schools will receive a play-specific study guide and the Festival's education coordinator will visit each of the 12 free admission schools to conduct a post-performance workshop. Through this project, 4,000 to 5,000 students will be given an opportunity see Shakespeare live and to engage in classroom experiences that demonstrate the power of language and literacy.