UConn's Frank Mack To Utah Shakespeare Fest

 Frank Mack, a veteran of theatre companies across the United States, is the new executive producer of the Tony Award-winning Utah Shakespeare Festival in Cedar City.. Mack begins his new gig Sept. 1, succeeding the recently retired R. Scott Phillips. 

Mack is currently serving in a leadership role at the Connecticut Repertory Theatre and teaching arts administration at the UConn in Stores. 

Mack has also worked as managing director at the California Shakespeare Festival in Berkeley, California; Geva Theatre Center in Rochester, New York; the New Jersey Shakespeare Festival in Madison, New Jersey; and Connecticut Repertory Theatre.

His skill set includes an emphasis on making data-informed decisions and cultivating long-term, mutually beneficial relationships with stakeholders. Mack has served as a management consultant at Center Stage in Baltimore, Maryland; the African Continuum Theatre Company in Washington, DC; the Contemporary American Theatre Festival in Shepherdstown, West Virginia; and community and university arts organizations along the east coast.

As part of the reorganization of Festival leadership prompted by David Ivers’ departure earlier this month, Brian Vaughn has been named as sole artistic director, helming the leadership of the artistic product of the Festival. Earlier this year, co-artistic director David Ivers left the Festival to become artistic director at the Arizona Theatre Company. Southern Utah University is the  home of the Festival.

Tickets are now on sale for the Festival’s 56th season, which will run from June 29 to Oct. 21. This year’s plays are Romeo and Juliet, As You Like It, Shakespeare in Love, Guys and Dolls, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Treasure Island, The Tavern, How to Fight Loneliness, and William Shakespeare’s Long Lost First Play (abridged).

The Utah Shakespeare Festival is part of the Beverley Taylor Sorenson Center for the Arts at Southern Utah University, which also includes the Southern Utah Museum of Art (SUMA).