for the ARTS record
Shakespeare by the Sea Festival Returning for its second year at the festival, Shakespeare on the Cape performs "Much Ado About Nothing" - in which a miserable man's plot to thwart the happiness of two couples leads to a chain-reaction of tragic-comic miscommunications.

"This year, it's an even more family friendly show," Eustis said of the show, which runs 8 p.m., Friday, Aug. 17 and 6 p.m., Sat., Aug. 18, in Bennett Hall. (Admission is $20 for NAC members, and $25 for nonmembers.) This year, Shakespeare on the Cape also offers a free "Midsummer Night's Dream" children's workshop at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Aug. 18 (Bennett Hall).

Eminent Harvard Shakespeare scholar Marjorie Garber revisits the island for this year's festival to present "Shakespeare and Modern Life."

New this summer is Mick Hales, the author of "Shakespeare in the Garden." He'll be presenting a slide show of his photographs of gardens from around the globe.

Nantucket Arts Council board member Philippe Schreiber has constructed a film series in conjunction with the Nantucket Historical Association and the Parks and Recreation Commission - 1955's "Richard III" and 1989's "Henry V" will screen at 8 p.m. at the Whaling Museum on Monday and Tuesday, respectively.

"The festival has grown substantially from one troupe initially and one speaker to what it is now," said the festival's co-chair, Hadley St. John, who counts this year's fare at two troupes, two speakers, a film series and a children's workshop plus two benefit cocktail parties, the first of which was held at the home of Beverly Hall "and was a huge success," St. John said.

For a full schedule of this week's events, see Seaside Shakespeare's ad on page 46.

Theatre: "Jack and the Beanstalk" After a sold-out run of "Cinderella," TWN motors through its first season of children's theatre with "Jack and the Beanstalk," written by Michele Vacca. Starring members of TWN's first professional summer resident company, the show introduces the audience to a newly adapted and interactive story of the young man who found a magical way to help his widowed mother after their milking cow goes dry.

Following the show, kids can meet Jack, his Mom and Milky the Cow during a Teddy Bear Picnic on the lawn of the church.

Containing a few special effects, "Jack and the Beanstalk" will certainly appeal to family-oriented people, especially those with little members.

When: Tues., Aug. 15 at 5 p.m. and Tues, Aug. 21 at

2 p.m. and 5 p.m. Encore performance: Thurs., Aug.

23 at 2 p.m. Where: Bennett Hall, 62 Centre St. Cost: $15; for an extra fee, audience members can

attended a picnic with the characters following the performance; For tickets or more information, call

the box office (downstairs at 2 Centre St.)

at 228-4305.

Theatre:

"To Grandmother's House We Go" Jetti Ames stars in "To Grandmother's House We Go" - a comedy about family members tripping on the generational gap. Ames plays "Grandie," the matriarch whose family descends upon her Connecticut Victorian for the Thanksgiving holiday; the turkey isn't the only one whose feathers get ruffled during the visit.

Claire Bossee plays "Harriet" Grandie's daughter and mother to three 20-something children: Beatrice (played by Los Angelino and summer resident, Samara Cohen), Muffy (played by Callie Kever) and Paul (played by Andrew Spencer), who brings with him a new girlfriend - - Twyla (played by Alex Kopko).

Only 16, Kopko plays a character 10 years her senior. "She carries it off marvelously," Karakula said. "She has such a sophistication about her onstage."

Beloved local actor Frank Morral plays Jared, Grandie's brother, and Ann Roman rounds out the cast as Clem, the nanny.

"The play was written 20 years ago, but it still holds up," Karakula said. "I like to do these family-oriented shows during the height of the season, because the audiences tend to be family-oriented people."

When:Wed., Aug 15; Thurs. and

Fri. Aug. 17 and 18; Tues., Aug. 21 - Sat., Aug. 25; and Tues. Aug. 28 - Sat., Sept. 1,

8:30 p.m. The matinee is Sun., Aug. 19,

at 3 p.m.

Where: TWN mainstage, downstairs at the

Methodist Church, 2 Centre St.

Cost: $25

Theatre: "Moby Dick! The Musical" Island visitors and residents are already oh-too familiar with the theatrical presentation of Nantucket's whaling past as a moneymaking tool. As such, the treatment this history receives in the musical comedy "Moby Dick" will probably resonate more here than it has anyplace else in the world, including its home stage in London's famed West End, where the show enjoyed a cult following in the early 1990s.

Written by Robert Longden and Hereward Kaye, "Moby Dick! The Musical" is a frame tale- - a story within in a story - about the bad teen girls of St. Godley's Academy for Young Ladies, who stage a slapdash performance of "Moby-Dick" (written by one of their very own students) as a fund-raiser for their impecunious Catholic school. The girls use whatever props they can find about the school to assist their performance: hockey sticks double as oars and bleachers become church pews. To cast the show, the Godley girls draft any and all available warm bodies, including their headmistress - who cross-dresses to play Ahab, the whaleship captain wildly obsessed with finding the white whale and killing it. Dead.

The show's performers now comprise TWN's first resident company: Dick Baker (SUNY Cortland), Erin Elizabeth Baltsar (Hartt School of Music), Donald Dallaire (University of Rhode Island), Caitlin Doyle (Emerson), Joe Gilmore (Wagner), Danielle Heaton (Emerson), Adam Ioele (Circle in the Square), Michael Keutman (University of Pennsylvania), Rebecca Kubaska (Hartt), Meridith Lark (Ohio State University), Tiffany Page (University of Rhode Island), Teresa Tokarowski (Manhattan School of Music), Caitlin Wiater (Loyola University).

"If you took 'Nunsense' and 'Dames at Sea' and mushed it together, that's kind of what 'Moby Dick! The Musical,'is about, except you have school girls instead of nuns, these bad little girls at a reform school," said the show's director, Roberta Esposito.

When: August 5, 16, 19, 20, 22-25.

Performance times are 8 p.m. every night but Wednesday night, when performances are 8:30 p.m. You can also catch 2 p.m. matinees on

Aug. 15, 16, 22, 23 and 24. (Got that? If not, go

down to the last step.)

Where: Bennett Hall (on the side of the First

Congregational Church, 62 Centre St.)

Cost: $50 Get more information as well as buy your tickets

online at www.theatreworkshop.com or call the box office at 228-4305. You can also visit the box office at 2 Centre Street from noon - 9 p.m.

(Mon. - Sat.) and Sunday, from 4 p.m. - 9 p.m. Life-saving Nantucketer in print Nantucketer Linda True makes an appearance in Michael Tougias' new book "Fatal Forecast: An Incredible True Tale of Disaster." The story relates the true story of two boats on a perilous lobstering trip to Georges Bank in 1980, when hurricane-force winds and 60-foot waves tormented the ships for hours.

"When the book's main character (Ernie Hazard) was rescued by a Coast Guard Cutter, he was in such bad shape the cutter requested a helicopter fly all the way out to Georges Bank to get Ernie and take him to a hospital. The helicopter pilots needed someone with medical training onboard, so they stopped at Nantucket and picked up EMT Linda True," said Tougias, also the author of bestseller "Ten Hours Till Dawn." "Linda said in all the years that went by she frequently wondered if Ernie Hazard made it and if so was he okay - and it wasn't until I called her and told her that Ernie was fine that she knew!"

Look for True in Chapter 27.

Music: La Catrina Quartet La Catrina, known in Mexican folklore as the beautiful figure of death, is the namesake for the Mexican quartet arriving on island this week.

The name seems macabre, but the musicians implore to the listener to visualize death as a woman with a "mischievous smile," who "pleads with us to seize the moment and through music - and perhaps a little dance- find life's meaning."

The four handsome, young men in the group cut a dashing figure of craftsmanship: Daniel Vega-Albela (violin); George Anthony Figueroa (violin); Jorge Martínez (viola) and Alan Daowz (cello). With the exception of Fugeuroa, all of the men attended Western Michigan University.

The show is Tues., Aug. 21, 8 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 62 Centre St. Tickets are $15 for adults and $7 for students. You can buy them at the door or in advance at The Antiques Depot, 14 Easy Street or the Lochtefeld Gallery, or by calling 228-1287.

Lecture: The Pirate Ship Whydah John Beyer speaks about the wreck of the pirate ship Whydah. Beyer is the former director of operations of Maritime Explorations - the organization that directed the search, discovery, and recovery of the treasures from the only pirate ship ever discovered off Cape Cod. He will discuss his tales from the deep, and what was discovered aboard the Whydah, which sank in waters off Cape Cod in 1717.

A one hundred-foot, three-masted slave ship, The Wydah hailed from London and made her first voyage in 1715, to the Caribbean. However, in February of 1717 - on only her second voyage near the Bahamas - she was captured by two pirate vessels. Her crew was overtaken by the notorious "Black Sam" Bellamy, a former English sailor turned pirate, and the Whydah spent the next two months commandeering and robbing vessels as she headed north along the east coast. On April 26, said to be heavy with treasure stolen from at least fifty-three ships, Whydah sailed straight into a howling no'reaster and foundered on the sandbars off Cape Cod. Out of a crew of 146, only two men survived, one of whom testified to the amount and variety of stolen booty on board the Whydah, which included 180 bags of gold and silver. Beyer will focus on the discovery of the ship's hull in 1998, and various interesting items recovered from the wreck site.

When: Thursday, August 16, at 7:30 p.m.. Where: NHAWhaling Museum, 13 Broad Street.

- Compiled by Marli Guzzetta I