Beckett, Coward join Slick Willy in new Cal Shakes season

September 11, 3:29 PMSF Theater ExaminerChad Jones

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Oscar-nominated actress Marsha
Mason makes her California
Shakespeare Theater debut next
summer in "Happy Days."

As the California Shakespeare Theater heads into its final show of the season (“Twelfth Night”), artistic director Jonathan Moscone has announced next summer's line-up.

The season will mark Moscone's 10th anniversary heading Cal Shakes, and he will direct “Romeo and Juliet” and Samuel Beckett's “Happy Days” starring Marsha Mason in her Cal Shakes debut.

Mark Rucker, currently helming “Twelfth Night,” will return with Noel Coward's “Private Lives,” and Aaron Posner makes his Cal Shakes debut directing “A Midsummer Night's Dream.”

Rucker is a familiar face at the Bruns Amphitheater (“Richard III” in 2007, “Romeo and Juliet” in 2001), but Posner isn't as well known. He's the artistic director of New Jersey's Two River Theater Company, where he recently produced “Macbeth,” conceived and co-directed by Posner and Teller of Penn and Teller, with magic designed by Teller.

Cal Shakes has previously produced “Romeo and Juliet” in 1977, 1983, 1989, 1994 and 2001; “A Midsummer Night's Dream” in 1974, 1975, 1979, 1985, 1991, 1997 and 2002. Next season's productions of Beckett and Coward mark the playwrights' first appearances at Cal Shakes.

Here's how the schedule shakes out:
- Shakespeare's “Romeo and Juliet,” directed by Jonathan Moscone - May 27-June 21
- Noel Coward's “Private Lives,” directed by Mark Rucker - July 8-Aug. 2
- Samuel Beckett's “Happy Days,” directed by Jonathan Moscone - Aug. 12-Sept. 6
- Shakespeare's “A Midsummer Night's Dream,” directed by Aaron Posner - Sept. 16-Oct. 11