As DSF gets ready to celebrate its Tenth Anniversary, we take a look back
at how one of Delaware’s favorite summer traditions got its start. Each month until this year’s Festival, we’ll hear the memories of a participant in the inaugural production of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (2003).
GARY SMITH – “Egeus”
The poster advertising the DSF production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is still on the wall above the desk in my office, right next to a drawing of the reproductive tract of a water snail (don’t ask – it’s what I get paid to do). I joined the production late and had very little time to get to know the cast, crew and admin folks. What struck me at the time was just how brave Molly Cahill and her family and friends had been to even countenance such an undertaking. The DSF started a couple of years after we had founded our own amateur theatrical society in Kennett Square (KATS) and that was proving hard enough, I can only imagine how difficult it was to create a professional company from scratch.
The scenery was constructed on the Cahill’s drive, the costumes were put together by a team of willing friends, and problems were dealt with on a just in time basis – like the upended milk crate that was procured to help the more mature actors (like me) actually climb on and off the platforms that served as a stage. The actors without arthritis simply bounded gracefully on and off as the scene demanded.
In our amateur company we have a saying that there are no small roles “only actors who can’t make up lines.” In the professional DSF, there are no small roles because that’s just how the company is.
