To Participants in Benefit, Grove Means Many Things

What the Grove Shakespeare Festival means to participants in the benefit “A Midsummer Night’s Eve at the Grove” on Monday:

DANIEL BRYAN CARTMELL: “I’ve been with the Grove for the last four years. I went to high school here. My whole family lives here. So it’s important for me to work in my hometown. . . .

“I don’t think we have to sell Shakespeare. I don’t think we have to pump him up to make him sound better. This theater provides work for actors, which is different from the humiliating process of trying to get a little part for a lot of money in Los Angeles.”

JOHN-FREDERICK JONES: “The extraordinary genius of Shakespeare--which moves from comedy to passion to tragedy--is simply not available in that breadth in any other playwright. It can be an enormously pleasurable experience, more pleasure than the kind of event that going to the movies might provide.

“(Also), one shouldn’t overlook the natural aspects of the park and the amphitheater. The community doesn’t realize how unique those natural phenomena are compared with other festivals around the country. It’s a very attractive environment.”

KAMELLA TATE: “(Shakespeare represents) a kind of emotional and intellectual extravagance to Americans, which is something we are missing through our obsession with movies and television. . . .

“I’m very interested in language, and that’s what’s important to me about doing Shakespeare. It’s a living, vibrant, personal type of writing that has lasted 400 years. That’s my personal reason for having the Grove to come to.”

KELLY McGILLIS: “I’m really pleased to be able to support this theater and the work that goes on here because I think regional theater in America is the only place that it’s exciting, where there are innovative ideas. . . .

“(A theater) that is solely devoted to the classics is so rare. It would be such a shame for a theater like this to go under because it is such a great exposure for actors and audience to language and poetry.”