Oregon Shakespeare Festival

From Angus Bowmer's 1935 Twelfth Night the Oregon Shakespeare Festival grew into one of the largest professional repertory theater companies in the country, a season that runs from March into October across three theaters in a small college town. Its signature stage is the Allen Elizabethan Theatre, open to the sky and modeled on the playhouses of Shakespeare's London; the Angus Bowmer and the Thomas are indoors. The festival has staged plays by other writers alongside Shakespeare since 1960, and over the decades it became the reason Ashland supports far more restaurants and inns than a town its size otherwise would.

The open-air stage and the long season also made it fragile. The pandemic shut the 2020 season, revenue fell from about $45 million in 2019 to about $25 million in 2020, and wildfire smoke in recent summers has cancelled outdoor performances. By the fall of 2022 audiences were still less than half their 2019 size. In April 2023, a week before opening night, the festival announced an emergency campaign, The Show Must Go On, to raise $2.5 million, warning that without $1.5 million by June the season could not continue, and it put planning for 2024 on hold. Foundation gifts and the public campaign kept it going; it reached its ninetieth season in 2025, and its 2026 season runs ten productions.

The three theaters sit together around a brick courtyard just above Lithia Park. Indoor plays begin in March; the outdoor stage opens in June. If you are coming in late summer, check the festival's smoke policy before you buy tickets for the Elizabethan.