Every year, over a dozen
Shakespeare companies around the country stage public
readings of the Declaration of Independence around the Fourth of July
weekend. These events have been inspired by an immigrant, from Britain
no less, Shakespearian actress and impresario Tina Packer, founder of
Shakespeare & Company, Lennox, Massachusetts. Shakespeare &
Company hosted the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America
(STAA) conference in January 2009, and Tina's description of their annual reading
of our founding document inspired several companies, including the
Shakespeare Players of Rochester, to host their own readings that year.
The Shakespeare Players of Rochester, a program of the
Rochester Community Players, will be organizing a public reading at the
Declaration of Independence on July 3, 2010 at 7:45 PM at the Highland
Park Bowl, prior to the start of our performance that evening of Much Ado About Nothing.
Colorado Shakespeare Festival;
Boulder, Colorado. Producing Artistic Director (And Past-President of STAA) Philip C. Sneed reports CSF will be doing a reading on the evening of July 3rd at 6:45, prior to their second performance of King Lear. This year they're doing it on their "Green",
where everyone can attend, even if they aren't seeing the show that
night. By the way, CSF will be hosting the 2011 STAA Conference next
January.
Shakespeare & Company; Lennox, MA, is definitely putting together a public reading again this year. Founder Tina Packer and Artistic Director Tony Simotes are thrilled that other groups are getting involved in similar programs. Says Elizabeth Aspenlieder,
Public relations Director, "This truly is an awesome day for us,
something that continues to grow in number and in scope (last year we
had close to 700 people join in!)"
Marin Shakespeare Company will read the Declaration of Independence from the stage at 4:30 pm prior to their July 4 performance of Tom Stoppard's Travesties, reports Lesley Currier, Managing Director. Travesties
is a play that deals with, among other things Life, Liberty, the
pursuit of Happiness, and the Russian Revolution. At the conclusion
of the 5:00 pm performance, theatregoers will be able to see the
fireworks at the nearby Marin County Fair. Marine Shakespeare Company
performs at Dominican University of California's Forest Meadows
Amphitheatre, in San Rafael, California.
Montana Shakespeare in the Parks
(and our audience) was
inspired by our first reading of the declaration of independence last
year on Poker
Jim Butte outside of Birney Montana. This year Joel Jahnke, Artistic
Director, will be joining
the 2010 acting company for a reading in Bozeman, Montana at 8:00 pm on
July 3rd
prior to their performance of Julius Caesar. Asks Jahnke, "What better
play than that to
have this moving document as a prelude?" The performance will take
place at the MSU Grove, east of the Duck Pond on 11th Street, on the
MSU Campus
The Globe of the Great Southwest, 2308 Shakespeare Rd., Odessa, Texas, will be reading the Declaration of Independence during performances of Happy Birthday USA! on Saturday, June 26 at 8:00, Sunday, June 27 at 2:30 & Saturday and Sunday, July 3 & 4 at 2:30 P.M., says Artistic Manager Kathryn Graybill.
The Carolinian Shakespeare Festival will present a public reading of the Declaration of Independence at about 6:00 PM on July 4th at Union Point Park as part of the Independence Day festivities of the City of New Bern, North Carolina. This historic document will be read aloud by members of the festival's cast, associated artists and supporters. "We think this is
a terrific way to celebrate the founding of our country," explained CSF's
director Mary McGinley, "This document
was written to be heard, to be read aloud in every town across the county. That's what we plan to do. When you hear it read aloud it really comes
alive. It is full of exciting and
profound ideas, truths and values. We
want to thank the City of New Bern for allowing us to share this event with the
community."
Oklahoma Shakespeare in the Park will again be reading the Declaration during the July 1, 2, and 3 performances this year of The Taming of The Shrew at Bicentennial Park, Downtown Oklahoma City. Managing Director Sue Ellen Reiman reports that a flood which left nearly four feet of water in their business office has not deterred them from opening this show on time or staging their public reading.
Shakespeare Orange County:,
Garden Grove, California: Tom Bradac, who founded Shakespeare Orange
County in 1992, reports that they will be presenting a public reading on July 4 at 10:30 AM. They have been presenting the Declaration of
Independence since 2008.
The Globe of the Great Southwest, Odessa, Texas: Home of the Globe Theatre and the Southwest Shakespeare Festival, their Artistic manager, Kathryn Graybill, reports that every year during the two weekends around the Fourth of July they produce Happy Birthday USA! a revue telling the story of the United States through music and tales. They created this production and change it a bit every year. In 2009, they intended to insert the Declaration into the production. They were also looking at the possibility of taking the reading to one or more free and public venues.
Shakespeare & Company; Lennox, MA. Tina Packard, founder of the internationally acclaimed theatrical performance, training and education company, retired as Artistic Director only this year. An immigrant from Britain with a naturalized citizen's love for this country, she has been staging a reading of the Declaration of Independence for years, and her example has inspired us all.
Shakespeare Orange County:, Garden Grove, California: Tom Bradac, who founded Shakespeare Orange County in 1992, reports that they started presenting the Declaration of Independence in 2008 and consider it an excellent event.
The Theatre at Monmouth, Monmouth Maine: According to producing Director David Greenham, the Theatre at Monmouth, also known as the Shakespeare Theater of Maine, planed a reading on Saturday, June 27, 2009, prior to their pre-season music/variety show, the Black Fly Follies
Montana Shakespeare in the Parks may have done the most remote reading in the country "but no less enthusiastic", said Joel Jahnke, artistic director. They did a reading prior to their 6:00 PM performance of The Tempest on July 4th. The location? The top of Poker Jim Butte Summit outside of Birney, Montana, in the middle of the northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation. said Jahnke, "I read it with the ten actors from our summer company just prior to our performance of The Tempest. We kept it as written, since that was the point of it all and it was very well received by everyone... We plan on doing it every Fourth from now on."
Oklahoma Shakespeare in the Park presented a reading of the Declaration of Independence prior to their 8:00pm performance of As You Like It on July 2nd and 3rd, said Kathryn McGill, co-founding artistic director. Performances were at the Myriad Gardens Water Stage in downtown Oklahoma City.
The Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival at DeSales Universityhad a reading at 5 PM on Saturday July 4th on their Main Stage after the 2 PM matinee performance of 1776, says Managing Director Casey William Gallagher. Members of the cast participated in the reading.
Richmond Shakespeare Festival Director of Education Cynde Liffick reported thatr they did theirs as part of the Festival of the Arts at Dogwood Dell in Richmond, followed by the Richmond Concert Band playing various Sousa tunes and finally ending with the 1812 Overture accompanied by Carillon bells and real cannons, then fireworks. Wow!
Shakespeare by the Sea did a reading the Declaration of Independence July 3 instead of doing their usual pre-show at Point Fermin Park next to the lighthouse built in 1874, reported Suzanne Dean & Lisa Coffi.
The Carolinian Shakespeare Festival also participated in this event by presenting a reading of the Declaration of Independence in beautiful New Bern, NC, said Mary McGinley; Producing Artistic Director.
The Woodward Shakespeare Festival in Fresno's Woodward Park also did a reading of the Declaration, in conjunction with a picnic meet and greet, prior to their July 4th performance of As You Like It.
The Montford Park Players conducted a reading of the Declaration of Independence prior to their July 4th show, An Evening of the Best of the Bard. according to John Russell, Managing Director, "I could see that audience members were very moved by the words, which were read by six members of our acting company seated in the audience."
Marin Shakespeare Company Managing DirectorLesley Currier reported that "we had our first ever July 4 performance last night -- The Importance of Being Earnest -- and read the Declaration to our audience beforehand from the stage."
Chesapeake Shakespeare Company (http://www.chesapeakeshakespeare.com) had eight actors read the Declaration before their performance of Twelfth Night, said Ian Gallanar, Artistic Director.
IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America
When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.
The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.
To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.
A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren.
We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us.
We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here.
We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence.
They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity.
We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.
And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.
John Hancock
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
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