Preserving the Past, Celebrating the Present, Inspiring the Future
...”We are such stuff as dreams are made on.”
THE MONTANA SHAKESPEARE COMPANY
With a company of actors from across the nation, the Montana Shakespeare Co. is Montana's resident, professional Shakespeare Co., performing full-length productions of the Bard's great works under starry summer skies in the Capital City.
Founded in 1997 the Montana Shakespeare Co. is a division of Artists Group, Inc., a 501(c)3 non-profit arts organization.
MEET THE DIRECTORS
KIM DeLONG
Helena, MT
Artistic Director, Co-Founder
Kim has been a lifelong arts advocate and theatre professional—a director, actor, fight choreographer and instructor—and has been part of theatre collegiate instruction for over 25 years. He is a professional actor and member of the Actors Equity Association and the Screen Actors Guild, and has worked professionally in theatre and film across the country. He received his MFA in Acting from Cornell University and is a member of the Artistic Committee of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America. He is also a screenwriter for Meridian Films.
MARTHA SPRAGUE
Helena, MT
Managing Director, Co-Founder
Martha has been actively involved in arts education for the past 20 years and teaches theatre at the Grandstreet Theatre School and tap dance at Queen City Ballet. She has done extensive musical theatre choreography and holds a BA in Theatre from Arizona State University and worked as an actress in Los Angeles before moving to Montana. She has also worked for the Montana Arts Council as its Director of Artists Services and Public Art Coordinator.
BOARD OF TRUSTEES
Executive Artistic Director
Kim DeLong
Helena, MT
Managing Director
Martha Sprague
Helena, MT
Brenda Strong
N. Hollywood, CA
Julie Johnson
Helena, MT
Tom Henri
N. Hollywood, CA
Katy Wright
Helena, MT
ADVISORY MEMBERS
Michael Dowling
Montana City, MT
Scott Pargot
Montana City, MT
MISSION STATEMENT
The Abridged Version!
Enriching and empowering individuals and community through extraordinary theatre!
The Extended Version:
With commitment to the blending of physical dynamics, poetic language and artistic collaboration, the Montana Shakespeare Company, aspires to create theatre of extraordinary quality.
With emphasis upon the works of William Shakespeare, MSC presents innovative and powerful full-length productions of his plays, along with other master dramatists, in an effort to enrich, enlighten, and entertain audiences of all ages while contributing to the economic & cultural health of our community and state.
A BALANCING ACT
by Molly Ellen Miltenberger
Helena, Mont. – July 2008
The Montana Shakespeare Company (MSC) grew dramatically since its birth as Kim DeLong’s dream baby in 1997, and came to its most successful season yet last summer.
Most audiences relish the enchanting evening shows held in the open-air on the temporary stage in Performance Square, a public meeting place on Last Chance Gulch. But for the performances that are “magical,” says Martha Sprague, managing director of MSC, there are others that are rained out; lines are occasionally drowned by the noise of by passing trucks, and at times, the actors have trouble breathing through wildfire smoke.
“With the magic come thunderstorms,” explains Kim DeLong, MSC’s executive artistic director, “We have to balance those two things.” MSC is foregoing its usual summer productions to concentrate on its future.
Martha Sprague estimates that about 2 million people nationwide travel each summer to see open-air Shakespeare performances. “There are a lot of people outside of Helena who are really intrigued by the possibility of seeing Shakespeare in Montana by a resident company based here.”
To bring that Shakespeare-seeking audience into Helena, Sprague and DeLong have decided that MSC needs a permanent location so that the funds devoured by building a temporary stage every season can be devoted to bolstering the company itself.
“Rather than just go full-steam ahead,” DeLong explains, “We want to step back, focus on our future, and build a structure that allows us to accomplish those things.”
DeLong first envisioned MSC when he toured Shakespeare’s Globe Theater in London in 1996, while the theater was under construction. DeLong was on a fourteen-day theater tour of England when he was struck with the desire to bring professional, world-class Shakespeare performances to Montana.
“It is really language that is written for the west,” says DeLong, citing Tina Packer, artistic director of Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Mass., “The London that Shakespeare was performed in at the time that it was written was more like Dodge City than it is like the London of today.”
DeLong, a fourth-generation Montanan, taught acting for 25 years at the University of Alaska and at Carroll College, and acted in summer performances like the California Shakespeare Festival. His vision of a Helena-based Shakespeare company was shared by Sprague, his wife.
Sprague has a close interest in the Helena artistic community. She has taught acting at Grandstreet Theater for 20 years, and she currently teaches tap dance at Queen City Ballet. Sprague graduated with a B.A. in Theatre from Arizona State Theatre, and has worked at the Montana Arts Council, where she coordinated a public arts program.
At the time that MSC began, Sprague says that there wasn’t much classical or professional theater in Helena, and it seemed to both her and DeLong that Helena was the perfect place to plant a Shakespearean company.
In 1997, they began MSC: a Helena-based organization that auditions professional actors from Montana and across the United States to find the perfect few who will make Shakespeare come alive in Helena. “We really want people to come to Helena to join in the cultural activities that are going on here,” Sprague says.
This year, it is becoming a more challenging task to bring the chosen actors here. Airfare has nearly doubled from the past few years. The stipend that MSC pays its actors buys less for them. And the construction cost of the temporary stage is draining a hefty part of the yearly budget that Sprague and DeLong would like to see going elsewhere.
A stage of their own could open the door for other opportunities. The season could extend from April until October, and the troupe could perform four shows instead of two, really profiting from the same round-trip airfare that brings actors in for the customary June-August season. “Now all of a sudden it’s a whole new ballgame,” says DeLong, “That’s where we’d like to be.”
Safety for the actors and intimacy with the audience are essential to creating the magic that MSC is going for. “We like intimate Shakespeare,” says DeLong, “It has to be close.” Another critical factor is control over the ambiance, so that production could be held in an environment unthreatened by weather or street sounds – or smoke.
The location is vital. Ideally, it would be a central, down-town area within Helena. “It’s really wonderful to be in the center of that energy, and the community has been really supportive of us… We want to give back a little [by] contributing to the economic and cultural vitality of Helena,” says Sprague. DeLong joins in: “We want to be in the heart of things.”
Although both Sprague and DeLong express regret that the MSC isn’t producing a play this season, their faces brighten at the thought of the future. Their next project is Bard Days, an affordable week of Shakespearean “ ‘Act’-tivity” for children grades 3-12, held July 28- Aug. 1 in Performance Square.
Professional actors from all over the country come in to introduce the students to Shakespeare from a cultural, a literary, and a performer’s perspective. Students perform iambic pentameter to hip-hop music, engage in stage combat, and learn to love the Elizabethan world of the Bard himself in what DeLong calls a “user-friendly” Shakespeare course.
Bard Days and past performances have already made a large contribution to turning Helena into the “capitol of the arts” that Sprague and DeLong would like it to be; it will be exciting to see MSC’s future contributions to the Queen City’s cultural vitality.
NEW ADDRESS:
We haven't moved, but the County has recently changed our mailing address. Write to us at:
Montana Shakespeare Company
6137 Moondance Rd.
Helena, MT 59601
phone:
(406) 459-4386—reservations
(406) 431-1154—information
shakespeare
photos: upper left: Luis Gallindo, "A Comedy of Errors", 2005;
upper right: Keri Safran, Julia Porter, "As You Like It", 2006;
lower right: Chris McKeon, "Hamlet," 2006
