Join us on February 22nd at 7pm at Pascal Hall in Rockport as we continue our 2025 season with the first of three Forgotten Classics of the 1930s, 40s, 50s – The Philadelphia Story.

This smash Broadway comedy, about an eventful wedding weekend at the estate of a wealthy American family, inspired an Oscar-winning film and the hit musical High Society.

It may be a stretch to refer to one of Katharine Hepburn’s most famous films as a “forgotten classic,” but that was the movie, not the play. None of us can remember a production of the play anywhere recently, and the play came first.

The second and third in the series are Bus Stop by William Inge on Saturday March 15th at 7pm and Detective Story by Sydney Kingsley on Saturday April 12th also at 7pm. All productions will be at Pascal Hall, 86 Pascal Avenue, Rockport.

Tickets are available now at www.everymanrep.org. They will also be available at the door, as well as from Left Bank Books in Belfast. You can also call the box office and reserve tickets: 207-236-0173. We encourage you to book early. Special thanks to Bangor Savings Bank for being our Series Sponsor.

Everyman Repertory Theatre presents its final reading of their ‘Forgotten Classics of the Stage’ series, Ben Jonson’s ‘Volpone,’ on Sunday, September 29th at 2:00 pm, at Pascal Hall, 86 Pascal Ave. in Rockport.

A merciless satire of greed and lust, Volpone — first staged in 1606 on London’s Globe Theater stage — remains Ben Jonson’s most performed play and is ranked among the finest Jacobean era comedies.

Set in Venice Volpone, “the sly fox” is a greedy, rich, childless “magnifico” pretending to be on his deathbed after a long illness to dupe Voltore (“the vulture), Corbaccio (“the raven”) and Corvino (“the crow”), three men who aspire to inherit his fortune.

In their turns, each man arrives at Volpone’s house bearing a luxurious gift, with the intention of having his name inscribed to the will of Volpone as his heir.

Mosca (“the fly”), Volpone’s parasite servant, encourages each of the visitors to believe that he has been named heir to Volpone’s fortune.

Then, mayhem reigns.

English politician and diarist Samuel Pepys observed after viewing a 1665 production of the play that Volpone was a “most excellent play; the best I ever saw, and well-acted.”

Coincidentally or perhaps in a competitive move, William Shakespeare penned a tragic play about greed and lust which most scholars place “in about 1606” titled Timon of Athens. Timon lavishes his wealth on parasitic companions until he is poor and rejected by them. He then denounces all of mankind and isolates himself in a cave in the wilderness.

The same scholars feel strongly that both Volpone and Timon of Athens alternated performances on the same Globe stage in 1606.

In 1976 comedic playwright, Larry Gelbart, most famous as a creator of the iconic television series M*A*S*H, relocated the story of Volpone to San Francisco in his highly successful Broadway stage farce titled Sly Fox featuring George C. Scott as Maxwell J. Fox. The comedy was successfully revived in 1978 and again in 2004.

Cast includes John Jurcheck, Cory Burns, Joseph Cote, Michael Amico, Nate Marx, Scott Anthony Smith, April Rejman, Christine West, and Peter Conant.

This event is an open seating venue and donations will be accepted at the door. Your donation helps us keep professional theatre alive and well. For more information please call (207) 236-0173.

The remainder of this series is dedicated to the memory of Dean Jorgenson.

Everyman Repertory Theatre’s “Forgotten Classics of the Stage” series continues with a rehearsed reading of Aphra Behn’s 1677 play “The Rover” on Sunday, Aug. 18, at 2 p.m. at Pascal Hall, 86 Pascal Ave.

This classic Restoration comedy about power, sex and money is the most famous play written by the first female playwright in Britain. Behn also wrote the first play ever set in the United States (“Oroonoko”).

Having famously worked as a spy for Charles II against the Dutch, Behn lost her meager income when the king refused to pay her. She turned to writing for an income. “The Rover” premiered in 1677 to great success, and the play earned an extended run, enabling Behn to earn her living from it.

As Virginia Woolf said in an essay on Behn, “Jane Austen should have laid a wreath upon the grave of Fanny Burney, and George Eliot done homage to the robust shade of Eliza Carter — the valiant old woman who tied a bell to her bedstead in order that she might wake early and learn Greek. All women together ought to let flowers fall upon the tomb of Aphra Behn, which is, most scandalously but rather appropriately, in Westminster Abbey, for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds.”

The cast includes AnnMarie Lowerre, April Rejman, Beverly Scott, Jennifer Hodgson, Andrea Itkin, Dagney Ernest, Jan Zimmerman, Scott Anthony Smith, Paul Hodgson, Michael Amico, Ryan Jackson and Joseph Cote.

This event is an open seating venue and donations will be accepted at the door, which help Everyman keep professional theater alive and well. For more information, call 236-0173.

The remainder of this series is dedicated to the memory of Dean Jorgenson.

A rehearsed reading of Oliver Goldsmith’s ‘She Stoops to Conquer’ will be presented on Sunday, July 21, at 2pm, in the 3rd floor Blue Cafe space at the Camden Opera House, 29 Elm St. Camden.

When Goldsmith’s play was first produced, it was discussed as an example of the revival of laughing comedy over the sentimental comedy seen as dominant on the English stage since the success of The Conscious Lovers, written by Sir Richard Steele in 1722. An essay published in a London magazine in 1773, entitled “An Essay on the Theatre; Or, A Comparison between Laughing And Sentimental Comedy”, argued that sentimental comedy, a false form of comedy, had taken over the boards from the older and more truly comic laughing comedy, though some people suspect that Goldsmith wrote the essay as a ‘puff’ piece to advertize the play.

Prepare to laugh!

The cast includes Jennifer Hodgson, Joseph Cote, Ryan Jackson, Scott Anthony Smith, and Paul Hodgson, with April Rejman, Michael Amico, and AnnMarie Lowerre.

This event is an open seating venue and donations will be accepted at the door. Take the elevator from the Opera House lobby up to the 3rd floor. Your donation helps us keep professional theatre alive and well. For more information please call (207) 236-0173.

The remainder of this series is dedicated to the memory of Dean Jorgenson.

Produced by the Everyman Repertory Theatre for Lux Radio Theatre and the Camden Opera House’s SoundCheck series. Everyman Repertory Theatre presents ‘Miracle on 34th Street’ at 7:30pm on January 5, 2024.

This Lux Radio Theatre-style adaptation will be presented on the 11th Day of Christmas! Choose-your-own reserved seats are $10. Sponsored by our Community Arts Fund. One-hour show will be recorded for free viewing later on Camden Opera House’s YouTube Channel.

Cast includes Ryan Jackson as Kris Kringle, Jennifer Hodgson as Doris Walker, John Jurcheck as Fred Gailey, with Beverly Scott, Andrea Itkin, Dean Jorgensen, Dagney Ernest, W. Joseph Cote, Jan Zimmerman, Scott Anthony Smith, and Paul Hodgson.

Tickets can be bought HERE.

The Everyman Repertory Theatre, in partnership with Camden Public Library – Camden, Maine is pleased to present a new series, “Forgotten Classics of the Stage” featuring rehearsed readings and lively discussions of famous but rarely performed plays.

The first event will take place on Sunday, November 26, at 2:00 PM in the Reading Room at the Camden Public Library and feature the 20th century play ‘Journey’s End.’

Journey’s End was first presented in 1928, written by the English playwright and screenwriter R.C. Sherriff. It is set towards the end of the First World War. The story takes place in an officers’ dugout in the trenches and was based on Sherriff’s letters home during his time as an officer. It played a clear role in informing and inspiring the Blackadder series of BBC comedies set during this period, though it has a more tragic bent.

The play was first performed at the Apollo Theatre in London on 9 December 1928, starring a young Laurence Olivier, and soon moved to other West End theatres for a two-year run. It was one of The Best Plays of 1928–1929 and quickly became internationally popular, with numerous productions and tours in English and other languages, as well as a film version, before falling from the repertoire.

“As soon as we announced it would be part of our Forgotten Classics of the Stage series, two of our cast members said they had seen productions in London on the 100th anniversary of the war’s end,” said Paul Hodgson, artistic director of the Everyman Repertory Theatre. “But then it immediately fell out of the repertoire again. It is a work of absolute genius, powerful, realistic, emotional, anti-war and brutally honest. It should be on the stage somewhere all the time.”

Cast includes Paul Hodgson, Jennifer Hodgson, John Jurcheck, Scott Anthony Smith, Joseph Cote, Ryan Jackson, and Jim Reitz.

The Everyman Repertory Radio Theatre will bring a radio dramatization of Dracula to the Strand Theatre stage on Tuesday, Oct. 31, at 7 p.m. This live show will feature a cast of ten actors and hundreds of sound effects.

The production stars the Everyman Repertory Radio Company, with Dean Jorgenson as Dracula, Scott Anthony Smith as Jonathan Harker, Robin Jones as Renfield, John Jurcheck as Dr. Seward, Joseph Coté as Van Helsing, and Jen Hodgson as Mina Harker. Other parts will be played by Andrea Itkin, Liz McLeod, Jim Reitz, and Paul Hodgson as well as other members of the cast. 

Dracula is directed by Paul Hodson, with a soundtrack designed and performed by David Berez and Geoff Parker.

This radio version of Dracula is adapted by PG Hodson from the Mercury Radio Theatre and CBC radio adaptations of “Dracula.” The story is based on the novel by Bram Stoker, published in 1897, in which a tale is related through letters, diary entries, and newspaper articles. At the opening, solicitor Jonathan Harker is on a business trip to stay at the castle of a Transylvanian nobleman, Count Dracula. Harker escapes the castle after discovering that Dracula is a vampire, and the Count moves to England and first plagues the seaside town of Whitby in the North East of England. Dracula recruits other vampires, including Lucy Westenra, the ward of Dr. Seward, and coincidentally, friend of Mina Harker, Jonathan’s wife. On Lucy’s “death,” he recruits his colleague from Holland Abraham van Helsing, and this team pursues Dracula to London and back to Transylvania for a final battle between good and evil, on the way freeing Lucy from her undead state.

Running time is 90 minutes.

Tickets are $15/General Admission. Beer and wine will be available at concessions. To buy tickets, or for more information, visit www.rocklandstrand.com or call (207) 594-0070. 

The Strand Theatre is located at 345 Main Street, Rockland.

Lux Radio Theatre-style presentation of ‘It’s a Wonderful Life,’ as heard on NPR’s Maine Calling!

Everyman Repertory Theatre opened their 2023 season with this ‘radio’ adaptation as part of the Camden Opera House’s SoundCheck series on January 6th.

Featuring Dean Jorgenson, Scott Anthony Smith, Ryan Jackson, Dagney Ernest, Joseph Cote, Jim Reitz, Andrea Itkin, Jan Zimmermann, Beverly Scott, Robin Jones, Paul Hodgson and Jennifer Hodgson, with Geoff Parker on SOUNDFX, and the show was directed by Paul Hodgson.

The Painting Speaks: Will Davis’ The Builders

Click here to watch