The Enduring Lure of Shakespeare Under the Stars

Over the past 25 years, director Glenn Elston’s Australian Shakespeare Company has entertained a staggering half a million punters across the country. Most well known for what is now a deeply ingrained tradition in the city – Shakespeare in the Royal Botanic Gardens (which returns for its latest season on December 30) — Elston recently received a prestigious 2014 Melbourne Award for his service to open-air theatre.

So how did we go from begrudgingly powering through plays in high school English to excitedly spending summer days with the Bard? "When I was studying, I was working with a fantastic director from America, and I got to do all sorts of things ... lighting, playing music, acting," Elston says. "It was just such a wonderful experience that I started to explore it more and more, and then the whole idea of doing it outdoors just seemed to fit really well, the whole marriage of art and nature was just a great combination that was inspiring, and off it went from there."

Guy Pearce, Tim Minchin and Nadine Garner are just some of the notable Australian performers who’ve since joined the casts of Elston's open-air productions since he founded the ASC in 1988. In that time, he and his company have weathered their share of mishaps while touring around the country. Bushfires, floods and storms have been the main offenders, followed closely by occasional marriage proposals in the audience, and stage invasions from spotlight-hungry possums. But Elston believes the unique kind of performance setting achieved in the open air more than makes up from any unforeseeable distractions.

"The main thing is the easy accessibility for the audience and to the play — in this environment, the actors, the audience, and the story all become joined together much more easily than you do in a traditional theatre space. Because people are much more relaxed, they’re really much more willing to just go along with the story and enjoy the contact with the actors, they can walk offstage and into the audience; they can participate. Everyone is readily available. Surrounded by nature — by the open air, the birds, the breeze — everything is stimulating, and that makes it enjoyable."

Australian audiences' enthusiasm for Elston's brand of Shakespeare has remained undiminished over the years; if anything, it has grown stronger over time. "We see more people coming back. It becomes something that gets passed on. What we have is an experience, more than just being a play. What has grown and grown over the years is people's appreciation of what it’s like to inhabit this kind of environment while being able to engage with Shakespeare’s text.”

Elston’s next production is a new version of the music-heavy satire As You Like It featuring ASC regulars such as Charlie Sturgeon and Claire Nicholls as well as newcomers like Louisa Fitzhardinge. The character of Rosalind and the play’s unique combination of romance, humour and insanity within Shakespeare’s canon makes the text one of the director's favourites.

"It’s a wonderful celebration of renouncing hatred for love and a story that rejoices in feminine strength, wit and comedy," he says. And with the sun out in full force and everyone giddy off the unavoidable Christmas craziness, a madcap day in the gardens is looking better than ever.

The Australian Shakespeare Company’s production of As You Like It runs from December 30 until March 14, and appears as part of Melbourne’s first SummerSalt Festival. Tickets are available here.