D AY S G O N E B Y
FAMOUS FACES
at the Williamstown Theatre Festival
Christopher Reeve first joined the Williamstown Theatre Festival as an apprentice, when he was 15 years old in 1968. The next summer, he turned Equity in Boston. He unsuccessfully would audition for Nikos Psacharopoulos annually, until 1980, when the artistic director found him suitable for a role (that he wouldn’t give to a non-Equity apprentice). Reeve, who already had donned Superman’s cape for two feature films, accepted the role and became a mainstay at the festival.
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WILLIAMSTOWN ...
he Williamstown Theatre Festival was conceived during winter 1954 by Ralph Renzi, Williams College’s news director, and David C. Bryant, chairman of the college’s active drama program. The original idea? To use the Adams Memorial Theatre on the Williams College campus for a summer theater with a resident company. The Williamstown Summer Theatre — it later was renamed the Williamstown Theatre Festival — opened in summer 1955. Bryant was joined by assistant director Nikos Psacharopoulos, a professor of drama at Yale University. They assembled a
40 Berkshire Landscapes I SPRING 2022
company of actors made up of young New York professionals, Yale actors and alumni and a few students from Williamstown. The season was successful, and it returned the next year, with Psacharopoulos as artistic director. Under his direction, the festival became a professional summer theater attracting actors of all stages of their career and shaping the careers of young actors through its apprentice programs. The festival, which received a Tony Award for Best Regional Theatre in 2002, opens its 68th season this summer. Here is a look back at some of the famous faces that have been part of the festival over the years. Sources: wtfestival.org, Berkshire Eagle Archives
