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Marquette Graduates Take Shakespeare Into Wisconsin State Parks

The live theater experience always carries with it a sense of event - the idea of everyone getting together in one place, often dressed nicely, to watch a thought-provoking or just entertaining stage play.  Summer in Wisconsin, though, affords another theater going experience people look forward to - the ability to watch live theater outdoors.

Credit Mitch Teich
Armando Ronconi, Hannah Klapperich-Mueller and Kaitlyn Martin acting out a scene from "A Midsummer Night's Dream" in the WUWM lobby.

And a group of recent Marquette University graduates is putting a unique spin on the concept of Shakespeare in the Park. Starting this weekend, they will be putting on a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream in state parks around Wisconsin. Hannah Klapperich-Mueller, Kaitlyn Martin and Armando Ronconi are three of the seven founding members of the Summit Players.

The idea started with Klapperich-Mueller when she decided that for her senior capstone project she wanted to do Shakespeare in the Park. "We were walking through the campground and there was one of those amphitheaters that I have never seen anyone use...," she says. "But I just thought, as a theater student, I would just love to get in there and be on that stage."

The company's premiere workshop and performance is Saturday, June 6th at the Richard Bong State Recreation Area near Kenosha. View their complete show schedule.