It may be Shakespeare Under the Stars’ 20th season but Moraine Valley Community College’s 2024 summer production marks only the third time the same play has been staged twice.
“King Lear” runs from July 18 to 21 outdoors at the school’s Gateway in Palos Hills. The July 20 staging includes a 6 to 7 p.m. preshow performed by the Moraine Valley Orchestra and directed by Maryann Flock.
“This is one of the few shows we’re repeating,” said Craig Rosen, who directed 2011’s “King Lear” and is directing the 2023-24 season finale show for Moraine Valley’s Academic Theater department.
“We repeated ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ and we repeated ‘The Taming of the Shrew.’ Everything else we’ve done has been new work to us.”
Rosen noted that Chicago residents Dan Scott, who retired in 2020 after several years as an adjunct professor of theater at Moraine Valley, and Pam Bagdzinski reprise their roles of the title character and Kent, respectively, in “King Lear.”
“To a lot of us, it’s the greatest of his plays, even including ‘Hamlet,’” said Rosen about playwright William Shakespeare.
“Dan, one of our primary actors, is now really of age to play the role. We were able to do this play age appropriately instead of having 19-year-olds play 40-year-olds.
“If they hadn’t done a wonderful job the first time, we wouldn’t have put them in the same roles. It’s a very large cast. It’s nice to have this consistency in these two big roles.”
The cast, which Rosen categorized as being full of professional-quality actors, includes Blue Island, Burbank, Chicago, Chicago Ridge, Homewood, Justice, Orland Park, Robbins, Summit, Tinley Park and Winfield residents.
“‘King Lear’ starts off almost like a fairy tale like, ‘Once upon a time, there was a king with three daughters,’” said Rosen, a professor and the theater program coordinator at Moraine Valley.
“The king asks his three daughters who loves him the most as he’s dividing up his kingdom for the end of his life. Two of the wicked daughters have the nicest things to say and he’s fooled by them. The kind daughter is most honest with him and Lear does not like what she has to say so he banishes her.
“It’s watching King Lear take a fall from being this great king to really a beggar in life.”
Rosen added that the costuming especially reflects the progressing darkness the king experiences while dealing with age, trust and family.
Attendees may bring chairs, blankets and refreshments to the free performances, but alcohol is not permitted. If it rains, the show moves inside Moraine Valley’s Fine & Performing Arts Center.
“Our campus is beautiful,” said Rosen of Naperville.
“It’s a very informal atmosphere where people can come and stretch out and just enjoy two things — the beautiful summer night and beautiful theater.”
Academic Theater returns for its 2024-25 season with “Carrie: The Musical” from Nov. 1 to 10; “Baby with the Bathwater” from Feb. 28 to March 9, 2025; “Fahrenheit 451” from April 25 to May 4, 2025; and “The Merry Wives of Windsor” from July 17 to 20, 2025.
Jessi Virtusio is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
‘King Lear’
When: 7 p.m. July 18-20; 5 p.m. July 21
Where: Moraine Valley Community College’s Gateway, 9000 W. College Parkway, between Buildings M and F, Palos Hills
Tickets: free
Information: 708-974-5500; morainevalley.edu/fpac
