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“There is no reason any part of Shakespeare’s plays needs to be opaque; we don’t ever have [to] settle for ‘getting the gist’ when we could be getting it all. We don’t have to be looking up all the terms and words and expressions we don’t understand prior to a performance of his works. Every country has translated his Canon into their own language; that’s essentially what we are doing here. Still, I hope my translation of Edward III offers clarity and force where the original cannot, and failing that, perhaps some renewed attention to the original itself. It is a marvel of a play.” Octavio Solis
Playwright
Octavio Solis
Octavio Solis is a playwright, director and fiction writer whose works have been produced in theatres across the country, including the Center Group Theatre in Los Angeles, South Coast Repertory, the Magic Theatre in San Francisco, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and the Dallas Theater Center. His fiction and short plays have appeared in the Louisville Review, Zyzzyva, Catamaran literary Reader, the Chicago Quarterly Review and Huizache.
Dramaturg
Kimberly Colburn
Kimberly Colburn (Dramaturg) is the Producer of New Work Development at Soulpepper Theatre in Toronto. She’s collaborating on many projects in development, including the musical Dixon Road by Fatuma Adar with Musical Stage Company, the musical Rose by Sarah Wilson and Mike Ross with Soulpepper Theatre, American Fast by Kareem Fahmy with Denver Center, and Hysterical by Jennifer Barclay with Arizona Theatre Company. Previously, she was South Coast Rep’s (SCR) literary director, co-director of PPF and led the theatre’s CrossRoads initiative, a playwright residency program. Highlights of dramaturgical work at SCR includes the world premiere productions of Poor Yella Rednecks by Qui Nguyen, A Doll’s House Part 2 by Lucas Hnath and Little Black Shadows by Kemp Powers. She was also literary manager at Actors Theatre of Louisville, where she was dramaturg for the world premieres of Partners by Dorothy Fortenberry and The Roommate by Jen Silverman, among others. Other world premiere projects include Bekah Brunstetter’s Going to a Place, the site-specific José Cruz González’s The Long Road Today, Matthew Lopez’s Zoey’s Perfect Wedding, Zoe Kazan’s Trudy and Max in Love and A Wrinkle in Time adapted by John Glore, among dozens of other productions, workshops and readings. She has worked with companies including Denver Theatre Company, Los Angeles Opera, Mixed Blood Theatre, The Playwrights Center, the Eugene O’Neill Playwrights Conference, Oregon Contemporary Theatre, Critical Mass Ensemble, Artists at Play, Musical Stage Company (Toronto), Soulpepper and Native Voices at the Autry.
In Print
Edward III
Edward III comes to life in a new version by playwright Octavio Solis.
Written after England’s victory over the Spanish Armada in 1588, Edward III follows the exploits of King Edward III and his son Edward, the Black Prince of Wales. England dominates on the battlefield as the play explores questions of kinghood and chivalry through the actions of King Edward and his son. Octavio Solis’s translation of the play provides all of the complexity and richness of the original while renewing the allusions and metaphors lost through time.
