Lack of Cash Begets a Greek Tragedy : Theater: Unable to raise enough funds, a theatrical duo cancels plans for a free Shakepeare festival in the park. Instead, Charmed Life Productions will stage Sophocles’ “Antigone.”

Frederick Hoffman and Mike Robelo won’t be doing Shakespeare in the park this year as they had hoped.

Their midsummer night’s dream proved too costly, but, in its place, they’re offering a lower-budget drama--a Greek tragedy.

The theatrical duo--co-founders of Charmed Life Productions--will put on Sophocles’ “Antigone” at Farnsworth Park, beginning June 26.

The production of the final play in Sophocles’ Oedipus trilogy will mark a modest success in their two-year struggle to bring a free Hillside Shakespeare Festival to the amphitheater in the park near the top of Lake Avenue.

Hoffman, 52, and Robelo, 63, have been involved in theater, movies and television all their adult lives. Lauded by the critics for classical plays in the Los Angeles area in recent years, Charmed Life Productions originated in San Francisco, where it co-founded a Shakespeare-in-the-Park Festival in 1961.

Hoffman and Robelo, who hope to make Altadena their new home base, say they particularly want to establish a permanent classical theater in the San Gabriel Valley so that underprivileged youths can be exposed to its high-level fare.

Their first plans were to do “As You Like It,” “Romeo and Juliet,” “The Tempest” or “King Lear,” along with a county-staged Renaissance fair.

After the pair got the endorsement of the Altadena Town Council more than a year ago, the Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation agreed to co-sponsor the enterprise.

They needed to raise more than $60,000 to cover the production cost of $5,000 for each of 12 performances.

The producers appealed to individuals, businesses, clubs and governmental bodies, but alas and alack, when the deadline for last summer’s show came, they had raised only $18,000, and that had been pledged with the stipulation that they raise the rest. Hoffman and Robelo thought their venture, like many a flower, was born to blush unseen.

But like true troopers, they didn’t give up. How else would a pair of veteran actor/director/producers think of solving a financial problem than by staging a play?

As a pilot project that they hope will raise community support and money, Hoffman and Robelo are now rehearsing for French dramatist Jean Anouilh’s modern adaptation of Sophocles’ tragedy, which will play in Farnsworth Park’s indoor Davies Theater.

The money for the 12-performance run--which Hoffman estimates will run about $5,000--came from “a couple of donors who wish to remain anonymous,” he said.

To recreate the feeling of Anouilh’s treatment, first staged in 1944 Paris during Nazi occupation, Hoffman and Robelo plan to use Nazi props and decor, including banners and posters, a couple of uniformed officers and a prelude of the German national anthem just before curtain time. “Maybe some people will leave,” Hoffman said, “but the theater is a public acting out of crisis. You go to it to see life and death issues.”

Robelo sees the tragedy, telling of Antigone’s execution for burying her brother against her uncle’s decree, as an allegory symbolizing the conflict between the state and the individual. “It was amazing that the Nazis permitted the play,” Robelo said. “Were the Germans so busy losing the war that they missed the play’s meaning?”

During the performance, a young man dressed as a German youth will pass out propaganda, leaflets that will say in German, “Don’t be alarmed. This is only a prop. It’s part of the play and not the real thing.”

“If you don’t read German, you can get alarmed,” Robelo said. “The idea behind all this is that when this play was done in Paris it was a dangerous play to do.”

By starting with a single, low-budget play, Robelo said, he and Hoffman will be able to gauge community support, which will help them determine whether to go ahead with their grander plans.

“If the citizens of the valley embrace our work,” Hoffman said, “then other productions will follow--including the summer Shakespeare festival in Farnsworth Park.”

Perhaps love’s labor will not have been lost.

“Antigone” will run Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. through July 18. Hoffman, who plays Creon, the male lead, is also co-directing the play, and Robelo is the producing director.

Tickets are $10 for general admission, $8 for students and senior citizens over 5, and $6 each for groups of 12 or more. A buffet dinner is included.

For reservations or further information, call (818) 798-6335.