The Utah Shakespearean Festival was founded in 1961 and presented its first season in 1962. It was started in response to two influences: summer tourists desiring more evening activities after visiting the area’s six national parks, and a young actor’s desire to produce great theatre. Festival Founder Fred C. Adams, having just come to Cedar City after trying out the New York theatre scene for a few years, was new to the College of Southern Utah (now Southern Utah University) in 1959. However, seeing 150,000 annual summer tourists to the area, he knew he had a great potential audience for a theatre festival.

Forty years later, The Utah Shakespearean Festival remains a total “experience” for its patrons, many of whom have been coming to every season for over forty years and now bring their children and grandchildren to the Festival. This feeling of partnership with the audience (which extends so far that the Festival even offers child care during the plays) is a trademark, inspiring patrons to speak of it as “their Festival.” Striving to satisfy our modern audience’s desires, the Festival works hard to remain accessible and to keep alive that bright and shining view first envisioned by Fred C. Adams over four decades ago.

Joe Cronin (left) as Julius Caesar and Brent T. Barnes as Popilius Lena. (Copyright 2001 Utah Shakespearean Festival. Photo by Karl Hugh.

A scene from the Utah Shakespearean Festival's 1999 production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. (Copyright Utah Shakespearean Festival. Photo by Karl Hugh.)

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