Macbeth (Rick Blunt) & Macduff (Tre Whitley) from 2022’s production of MACBETH.
MACBETH opening night at St. Joseph’s Church, Rochester, NY, July 2022.
Macbeth, July 2022. Directed by Chad Bradford.
Witch (Mykenzie Gordon) from MACBETH, July 2022.
Sea Serpent Puppet Parade, July 2021.
Parading on the lakefront of Silver Lake, Sea Serpent Puppet Parade, July 2021.
Puppetry from The Mariner’s Revenge Song by the Decemberists, covered by the cast of Songs & Sweet Airs, July 2021.
Cake choreography in the MacArthur Park dance number by the cast of Songs & Sweet Airs, July 2021.
https://www.shakeonthelake.org
Shake on the Lake (SOTL) is a non-profit, professional theatre company that produces a summer Shakespeare tour, a winter season, and innovative education programming. Our summer tours are designed to be staged outdoors, are fast (90-minutes or less), fun, and physical, with a small ensemble of performers, double and triple-cast to play all the parts. In the “Spirit of Shakespeare,” SOTL employs a collaborative, ensemble-driven process centered around play. We incorporate original staging practices like: performing outdoors in natural light; audience interaction; improvisation; live music; and inserting modern language and references into the script, to make the shows accessible and relatable to ALL audiences, whether they are new to Shakespeare, or seasoned Shakespeareans. The end result is a community centered around art and culture that is playful, funny, tragic, and speaks to our shared humanity.
Our mission is to use theatre and the performing arts to inspire and re-imagine community through performance, education, and creative placemaking. We specialize in serving rural communities and underserved populations in the Silver Lake, NY region, by bringing high-quality professional theatre productions and innovative arts education programming to the community.
Founded in 2012, SOTL started with one Shakespearean show for four performances, in one location, on Silver Lake, NY. Hence, Shake(speare) on the (Silver) Lake. Since then, we now produce a four-show season, serving over eight counties in Western New York State.
Adapted & Directed by Josh Rice
Puppet Design by CB Goodman
Set Design by Vinny Mraz
Directed & Devised by Courtney Bennett-Baker
An immersive theatre/agri-tourism collaboration between SOTL and Burley Berries and Bloom
A co-production with the New York State Puppet Festival
Adapted, directed, & designed by Josh Rice
Voices UnCaged is our theatre outreach program serving the incarcerated. Founded in 2015 by Associate Artistic Director Chad Bradford, SOTL has annually taught this program in residence at Groveland Correctional Facility since 2016, working with the incarcerated population to create devised performances inspired by Shakespeare and self-reflection by the inmates, for the inmates. SOTL also performs their annual summer touring productions inside Groveland Correctional Facility.
Voices UnCaged is our theatre outreach program serving the incarcerated. Founded in 2015 by Associate Artistic Director Chad Bradford, SOTL has annually taught this program in residence at Groveland Correctional Facility since 2016, working with the incarcerated population to create devised performances inspired by Shakespeare and self-reflection by the inmates, for the inmates. SOTL also performs their annual summer touring productions inside Groveland Correctional Facility.
SOTL’s pre-professional training and residency program in collaboration with Perry Central School. Each spring, students are immersed in a intensive theatre-making process that culminates in a performance(s) at PCS, as well as during the summer as a pre-show “Green Show” before SOTL’s mainstage touring performance. The goal of the program is to introduce students to the process of theatre-making from creation to script to rehearsal to performances, while creating a homegrown pipeline of talent for the professional company
A co-production with the New York State Puppet Festival
Adapted, directed, & designed by Josh Rice
Our 2018 Groundlings program, mashing up the worlds of Shakespeare and WWE-style professional wrestling
The Witches, with our Groundlings students
Our 2017 Groundlings program, a mashup of Shakespeare and Star Wars