New theater festival Summer Shakes to feature all female-identifying cast

Gainesville’s groundbreaking new theater festival, Summer Shakes, will address sexism and unequal representation within the theater community by producing two Shakespeare plays performed exclusively by a female-identifying cast.

Auditions for the two plays, “Julius Caesar” and “Richard III,” were held in Weimer Hall on May 9 and May 10, where actresses were asked to perform a one-minute classical monologue traditionally performed by a man. The auditions will continue today from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. in Weimer Hall/

According to the press release, Summer Shakes, which was started by UF students, Logan Vonada, Samantha Stone and Taylor Bartenope, strives to reinvent Shakespeare through messages of empowerment and femininity in modern society.

Bartenope, co-founder and production manager of Summer Shakes, said the most important part of creating the festival was making sure that the outcome accurately reflected the founder’s mission.

“We’re all very active in our beliefs in politics and progressive ideals, so we knew that we wanted the festival to be inclusive,” the 22-year-old tourism, events and recreation management senior said. “We really wanted to include all these different people who aren’t as represented, not just in Gainesville, but in theater in general, because there are still different parts of the arts that are still so heavily male-dominated, and it would be really cool to include girls who have just as much talent, just as much skill and to really feature them.”

Bartenope said Shakespeare was chosen because in order to fulfill Summer Shakes’ desire for inclusiveness, there needs to be enough available resources for those who wish to participate.

“Shakespeare is accessible to everyone. You don’t need to have money to read it; you can Google it and read it online because it’s no longer copyrighted,” Bartenope said. “We’re also interpreting the plays in different ways that are not going to just be point-blank Shakespeare. We’re making sure we can make a statement about ego-masculinity and femininity by including those female roles.”

Hannah Smith, a 20-year-old UF political science junior, said that while she hadn’t been involved in theater since high school, she was inspired to audition due to the all-female cast and directors.

“I think sometimes women have to make a space for themselves, whether it be in the arts or anywhere else,” Smith said. “This production, I think, could have a great opportunity for that.”

Smith said she believes the limitability in the roles available to women in theater can be summed up to the fact that male writers are valued more.

“Male writers are paid more and taken more seriously,” Smith said. “When the opportunity for male writers is skewed in their favor, we have a narrower viewpoint represented.”

Summer Shakes hopes to fight against this inequality in representation by emphasizing the importance of female acting, directing and producing in theater.

“We want people who come to see our plays to feel empowered, to feel inspired and to realize that there’s a lot of girls in the arts that can direct, produce, act, paint and perform,” Bartenope said. “There’s so much that can be done for such little resources, you can do anything that you set your mind to, and for us, it was a theater festival.”

Summer Shakes will be featuring productions of “Julius Caesar,” directed by Stone, and “Richard III,” directed by Vonada, with show dates and times still to be announced.