Shaw Festival is a theater festival held every year in the town of Niagara-on-the-Lake in Ontario, Canada. The festival celebrates the work of Irish-born playwright George Bernard Shaw in three theaters. The festival runs from April through November.
Shaw lived from 1856 to 1950. The festival emphasizes plays and musicals written during that time or works that take place during that period. Although the festival revives some plays by Shaw every season, it also presents works by other playwrights and by musical comedy composers.
The Shaw Festival began in the summer of 1962 when the upper floor of the historic Courthouse in Niagara-on-the-Lake was converted into a small theater. That year, local lawyer and playwright Brian Doherty organized eight weekend performances of two Shaw plays. The next year, the Shaw Festival was established as a nonprofit organization.
In 1973, the Festival Theatre opened to house large-scale productions. In 1980, the festival acquired the Royal George Theatre, which had been built in 1913 to present vaudeville shows. The Royal George became the home of musicals and mystery plays as well as lunchtime one-act presentations.
See also Shaw, George Bernard.
