Embattled leader Nataki Garrett resigns from Oregon Shakespeare Festival
Nataki Garrett directs rehearsal of Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s “Confederates.” Photo: Maya Phillips/Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2022 Photo: Maya Phillips/Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2022
Nataki Garrett is resigning from her leadership role at Oregon Shakespeare Festival at the end of May, the Ashland, Ore., company — one of the nation’s largest and most important regional theaters as well as a favorite destination for Bay Area theater fans — announced Friday, May 5.
Neither Garrett, an Oakland native, nor Board Chair Diane Wu gave a reason for the departure, and both declined to be interviewed. In June, board member and playwright Octavio Solís (“Quixote Nuevo,” “Se Llama Cristina”) will assume interim leadership duties, including the task of finding a permanent successor.
“I am leaving with an eye on the future of the field,” Garrett said in a statement. “We all know that while our doors have reopened, the world is not the same.”
Open to the sky, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Allen Elizabethan Theatre seats 1,200; pictured are the set and ensemble of “Alice in Wonderland.” Photo: Kim Budd/Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2019 Photo: Kim Budd/Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2019
The industry’s challenge and opportunity, she went on, is to rebuild “with actors, staff, audiences and artistic leaders who reflect the richness of our country’s diversity.” That’s been her mandate, she concluded, “and will continue to be my mandate as I work in the industry.”
“The board is grateful for the contributions Nataki has made to the advancement of theater and for extending OSF’s leadership within the theater community around the nation,” Yu said in a statement.
Garrett, who had previously led Denver Center for the Performing Arts, has faced many obstacles in her four-year tenure even beyond what other theater leaders endured during the pandemic. She’s a Black female leader in a town that’s approximately 90% white. She’s received death threats on the job and is shadowed by a security detail when she leaves her home. In January, her co-leader, David Schmitz, announced he was departing, which meant Garrett’s title shifted from artistic director to interim executive artistic director — an unusual structure in an industry where most large theaters are run by a pair. That move coincided with layoffs, furloughs and a hiring freeze.
Nataki Garrett with Assistant Director Raphael Massie in a rehearsal of “How to Catch Creation” at Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Photo: Kim Budd/Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2019 Photo: Kim Budd/Oregon Shakespeare Festival 2019
Last month, the company announced a fundraising drive, “The Show Must Go On: Save Our Season, Save OSF,” saying it needed to raise $2.5 million, $1.5 million of which by June, in order to complete its current season. It canceled one show in its lineup, “It’s Christmas, Carol!” and paused plans for 2024 and beyond. The company also transferred some of Garrett’s duties to the board.
The move marks an about-face from the attitude Garrett displayed in a February interview with The Chronicle. “I’m super stubborn, and I come from revolutionary stock,” she said at the time of her obstacles.
In January, Nataki Garrett was appointed interim executive artistic director at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, where she’d previously been artistic director. Now she’s resigning. Photo: Nataki Garrett Photo: Nataki Garrett
But she also said, “When it’s time to pass it on to somebody else, I want to set up the next generation of leaders for this place to be able to do more than just make it survive.”
Asked for advice for other female leaders of color, she added, “Organizations put their money where their desires are. … How your highly resourced donors support the organization is how it supports you, and if that is not intended to support you, you will know it very quickly.”
Source: SF Chronicle Datebook
