Sat 6/1 @ 11AM-6PM
Summit StageFest is back at Akron’s Highland Square for the third year, with local food, local art and —the heart of it all — performances by a variety of local ensembles and performers. They include theater and dance troupes, storytellers, comedians, improv ensembles, poets, barbershop quartets and even a martial arts demonstrator, on five stages, adjoining porches and on the street.
There will be student ensembles, established groups such as the Ohio Shakespeare Festival, Weathervane Playhouse and Western Reserve Playhouse, up-and-coming groups such as the Millennial Theatre Project, kids theater
There’s even a senior citizens’ readers theater group: The Tower Eighty Players. It features retirees reading everything from Dr. King to Dr. Seuss to T.S. Eliot. It’s led by 90-year-old Akron resident Marvin Phillips, who directed two of the first three plays (both by Moliere) performed at one of Chicago’s top professional theaters, the Court Theatre, back when it was founded as an amateur group at the University of Chicago in 1955. (The other was directed by Paul Sills, who co-founded Second City).
And it’s all free, a chance to sample offerings from the many performers active in the area and make a note of which ones you’d like to see more of.
Akron, OH