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The Forest Theater Guild is a local non-profit 501(c)3 organization dedicated to promoting the performing arts in our community through community theater endeavors and promoting mentoring of the theater arts. Originally founded in 1910 by Herbert Heron as the Forest Theater Society, the current organization, now known as 'Forest Theater Guild's' mission is to present quality performing arts and to foster growth and appreciation of the dramatic and allied arts among the broad community utilizing community talent with emphasis on youth.
The purpose of the Forest Theater Guild is to uphold the heritage and integrity of Carmel's historic Outdoor Forest Theater through stewardship, preservation of its unique character, and enhancement of the use of the theater property to promote community theater, films and events that support our mission of community theater and art.
The oldest outdoor theater west of the Rockies, the Forest Theater was built in 1910 by Herbert Heron and Carmel's Bohemians to provide an open-air theater where plays could be produced by "locals, who would also have the fun doing the acting, directing, lighting, costuming, and staging." (Personal letters of Herbert Heron). The Guild continues this tradition and the shared vision that community theater is an essential societal value in our current culture and continues to encourage arts for our youth and betterment of our society.
Each year, the Forest Theater Guild presents quality productions annually at the historic Outdoor Forest Theater in Carmel, California.
Past Productions Include:
The Guild's Apprentice and Mentor program was established to train students in the art of stagecraft, effectively providing an outlet for youth not wishing to be on-stage, while supplementing the need for stage technicians to support the "backstage" requirements of Guild productions. As with the All-Star Productions, the apprentice and mentor program is based on the state standards for education in the visual and performing arts, ensuring that the students are responsible for meeting established levels of academic rigor in return for college credit. New for 2010 Season, and dependent on available funding, is a collaborative project with the local schools, colleges and Universities is to establish a Live Event Production Academy for middle school and high school & college students.
The evolving concept for the Academy, a leadership academy in theater arts, is based on the Guild's longstanding and highly successful apprentice and mentor program for training youth in the art of stagecraft. We are continuing this program and mentoring students on both our live productions, our Films in the Forest Series and for our young entrepreneurs program in theater management (concessions & box office) during the entire 2010 season.
In 2010, the Guild is proud to present the beloved Classic, Robert Louis Stevenson's "Treasure Island", directed by Mark Englehorn and produced by our Board President, Rebecca Barrymore who is also serving this season as our Artistic Director for the FTG. Our second dramatic production will be another great children's classic, "Alice In Wonderland" written by Lewis Carroll and directed by Mark Englehorn.
Auditions begin April 10th and 11th at the Theater for 'Treasure Island' and May 28 & 29th for 'Alice In Wonderland'.
We are expanding the popular Films in the Forest series to include special film nights and events that will reach out to our larger community with a CSUMB Teen Film Festival returning for it's 2nd year on June 20th and a surprise, Oscar award winning film TBA in June for a major fundraiser event for the 'BLUE OCEAN FILM FESTIVAL', so look for our announcement in the newspapers and on our website in May 2010.
Youth Development. In 2009, the All-Star student program directly impacted more than 1000 students. The program was exceptional in that efforts to increase recruitment for performers and audience diversity were hugely successful, drawing individuals from King City, Soledad, Greenfield, Gonzales, Salinas, and Watsonville to the All-Star productions. Moreover, several students from South County also performed in the summer musical production of "Bandido" at the Outdoor Forest Theater in Carmel; thus increasing audience diversity in the Carmel venue.
Youth Scholarship Award: The Guild established the Michel Willey Youth Scholarships in memory of our beloved board member who was deeply committed to youth development in the Arts. In 2010, we will be honoring scholarships to talented students selected from the Guild's youth programs. This scholarship is awarded to student/s based on talent, devotion to dramatic arts and a need. The student/s is/are selected from the Guild's youth programs.
The annual Films in the Forest series and the 'Monterey Bay Film Festival' (formerly The CSUMB Teen Film Festival) returns on June 20th at 7pm and the very popular "Films in the Forest" features classic films on the big screen. Look for our 2010 schedule to be announced soon on this website with links to purchase or sponsor a film event.
Maintain the Vision!
The Forest Theater Guild is a viable cultural and economic force in our community, and we invite you to be a partner in our Mission and our programs. Please consider joining us today. Giving is easy. We offer several levels of membership and we provide generous benefits. Most of all, you will know that you are being pro-active in preserving the cultural, economic, and historical values that define our special home on the Central Coast.
"Community creates theater, but theater builds community." (Luis Valdez quoted) We count on you to help us build this special community. For more information, please visit the website at www.foresttheaterguild.org.
THANK YOU!
President
Rebecca J. Barrymore
Vice-President (outgoing President 2009)
Dr. Barbara Mossberg
Treasurer
William Birch
Secretary
Crystal Honn
MEMBERS OF THE 2010 BOARD OF DIRECTORS:
Brian Grossi
Kathleen Hendricks
Joanna Tupman
Keith Decker
Safwat Malek
Debbie Heron (Herbert Heron family)
Jeff Condit
Tom Livelli
Jeffrey Thompson
Leigh Gray
Rob Profetta
Megan Terry
Honorary Board Members:
Susan Willey
Megan Terry
In Memoriam
Michel Willey
Staff
Tyler Heron (grandson of founder, Herbert Heron), Administration
William Birch, Bookkeeper
Peter DeBono, Special Projects Consultant
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