"Beethoven, Bach, Wagner, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Debussy, Chopin, Verdi, Strauss and Francis Scott Key could have marched into the room for all I cared. I still wouldn't have looked up." That's what Russell Crouse said after Cole Porter first played him the score of Anything Goes. He and his collaborator, Howard Lindsay, then concocted a merry musical mix of mayhem and madness on a Transatlantic crossing to bridge the spectacular songs in Porter's outstanding score. In between the melodic and lyric perfection of "You're the Top," "I Get a Kick Out of You," "Blow, Gabriel, Blow," "All Through the Night" and the title song, you'll still find nightclub star Reno Sweeney setting sail, Moonface Martin (Public Enemy #13 with aspirations to be #1), and bounder Billy Crocker, stowed away in hopes of seducing heiress Hope Harcourt. But at WTF, you'll find them alive, well and ensconced aboard an outrageously reinvented production - captained by Artistic Director Roger Rees.

"In olden days, a glimpse of stocking was looked on as something shocking! Now, heaven knows..."

Anything Goes

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2006

"Relentless caper for all those who step / The legend of their youth into the noon." With this quote from his spiritual and literary mentor, Hart Crane, Tennessee Williams began his last great lyric play. A movie star who's seen better days, Alexandra Del Lago (travelling incognito as "Princess") occupies a hotel room with a young man, Chance Wayne. chance hit Hollywood with big dreams. Now he's returned to his hometown with nothing to show for himself but a faded movie queen's desperate attentions. Does he really believe Princess still has the clout to secure him that screen test, or has Chance really come home to start up with the girl he ruined years before? The sweet bird of youth, Williams tells us, perches nearby for such a very short time. Nothing to be done, except make the most of that bird before it flies, flies away.

"...the biggest of all differences in this world is between the ones that had or have pleasure in love and those that haven't...between the spectators and the performers..."

Sweet Bird of Youth

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"A plague on both your houses!" ROMEO AND JULIET, one of Shakespeare's earliest plays, has become western culture's defining romance. As old as the ancient Italian town in which it's set, yet as urgent, inevitable and shocking as today's headlines. A star-crossed couple, more in love than any two people have a right to be, find each other, and are ultimately undone, in the midst of a terrible, unyielding and blood-thirsty feud. Will the day ever come when we take up Shakespeare's challenge to stare down bigotry with tolerance? This summer at WTF, an unmissable production of one of the greatest plays of all time.

"For never was a story of more woe, than this of Juliet and her Romeo."

Romeo and Juliet

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"A complex, plot-driven variety of crime play in which the puzzle is paramount, clues are provided from which the solution may be deduced, and accompanied, if successful, by a final plot twist which leaves the audience stunned." That's how the Oxford English Dictionary describes the "whodunit." The London Times describes DOUBLE DOUBLE as "a classic of whodunitry and a glossy romantic thriller. It should be seen to be believed." Phillipa James picks up a bum from London's Embankment and brings him to her late husband's luxury flat. A purely business arrangement, as she explains to the down-and-out Duncan McFee, who happens to bear an uncanny resemblance to her dearly departed mate. In exchange for just a tad of impersonation, and the signing of some legal papers, Phillipa offers Duncan money, food and shelter. That's the deal. But is it the whole truth? Can Duncan escape from this seductive trap with his bedraggled dignity intact? Is there a more fun way to end the summer than with a good, old-fashioned thriller?

"There's a smart answer to that, if I could think of it."

Double Double

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Fired unceremoniously from the syndicated TV hit, Beach Detectives, pill-popping Lucy Santiago heads home to her family in Bolivia. All she wants to do is forget her troubles and self-medicate, but her wildly eccentric clan, and a mysterious spirit living under Simon Bolivar's campaign bed have a decidedly different agenda - forcing Lucy to finally confront not just her own troubled past, but the aggrieved history of a conquered people.

"There's no light at the end of the tunnel. It's all just tunnel from now on, Gringo."

Lucy and the Conquest

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Three parents of severely challenged children face lives of enormous pressure and quiet desperation, physical exhaustion and psychological burden.  And endless progression of days and devastation.  It's the hardest thing for any parent to imagine - so our playwright, John Belluso, imagines it for us, with disarming honesty and an invigorating sense of humor, in this intense and remarkable play, drawn from a real-life incident, which invites us to think about the unthinkable.

"She screams, only for us.  And if we don't go to her, then we are horrible people."

Nervous Smile, A

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Meet Dedee Truitt, a "troubled" 16 year-old who moves in with her gay half-brother in small town Indiana and runs off with his boyfriend and $10,000 from his safe deposit box. (And that's just the first act.) Dedee's wild ride - culminating in birth, death, and the search for Bananas Foster - wreaks havoc on the lives she touches, but also affects them in unexpected ways. A smart, moving, and wickedly funny adaptation of Don Roos' cult movie hit. And yes, it's a musical!

"This chair is a car. It's the theater. Deal with it."

The Opposite of Sex

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A rousing evening of songs, poetry and historical speeches.

Uncle Sam I Am: A 4th of July Celebration

Free Theatre, now in its 20th season presents DEMON DREAMS, a rollicking musical fantasy that fuses traditional Japanese storytelling with high-octane hip-hop to tell the tale of three lonely demons who must decide the fate of humankind.

Demon Dreams

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Paradise Now - leapFROG Play

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Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson - leapFROG Musical

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W 52

All 2006 Programs

Anything Goes

Sweet Bird of Youth

Romeo and Juliet

Double Double

Lucy and the Conquest

Nervous Smile, A

The Opposite of Sex

Uncle Sam I Am: A 4th of July Celebration

Demon Dreams

Paradise Now - leapFROG Play

Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson - leapFROG Musical

W 52Williamstown Theatre Festival Logo52

All 2006 Programs

Anything Goes

Sweet Bird of Youth

Romeo and Juliet

Double Double

Lucy and the Conquest

Nervous Smile, A

The Opposite of Sex

Uncle Sam I Am: A 4th of July Celebration

Demon Dreams

Paradise Now - leapFROG Play

Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson - leapFROG Musical

W 52