For more than 20 years the once renowned Shakespeare Festival Theater in Stratford has deteriorated, it’s stage bare and dark, and today is much like the spooky theater in “Phantom of the Opera.”
Meanwhile, numerous attempts to revive the legendary Elm Street showcase and raise the curtain on its deep, massive stage have ended in one Bard tragedy after another.
On Monday night in Town Hall, the new Town Council will officially kill yet another deal to renovate the theater, this time with Rhode Island theater producer Bill Hanney, who did not include a performance bond — as required by state law – in a contract approved by the former council last June.
That resulted in the contract being ruled illegal by former Town Attorney Richard Buturla, and again recently by current Town Attorney Tim Bishop.
Now, many are wondering, as Frank Sinatra once crooned in a famous song, if this could be the “final curtain” for what was once the state’s biggest tourist attraction.
To be or not to be indeed.
Finally! For years Stratford’s singsong about Sikorsky Memorial Airport was, “if it isn’t safe, it should be closed.” Now the chickens have come home to roost on the Shakespeare Theatre. Former mayor Jim “Moron” and the administration held onto this fading dream with the misguided vision of people bypassing Broadway and the Toronto Shakespeare franchise to come to Stratford. Tear the place down and be done with it!
Comment by The Count — February 6th, 2010 @ 8:43 am