PA Shakespeare Festival opens with ‘Charlotte’s Web’

“Charlotte’s Web” brings a trio of firsts to Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival in Center Valley.
E.B White’s beloved children’s classic, adapted by Joseph Robinette, “Charlotte’s Web” opens for the first time at the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival (PSF) on the campus of DeSales University.
The first summer show aimed at young audiences since the coronavirus pandemic shut down the long-running festival’s live summer performance slate during 2020, “Charlotte’s Web” offers family-fun for all ages.
The show premieres on PSF’s first-ever outdoor stage, the Air Products Open Air Theatre, specifically built to provide an open air, outdoor summer theater experience.
“I think the show is an appropriate place to come back from” the coronavirus pandemic, said Matt Pfeiffer, “Charlotte’s Web” director, a PSF actor and a DeSales theater program alumni.
Pfeiffer said much of PSF’s previous children’s programming and backlist of repertoire had been light-hearted, fun fare with performances of “The Little Mermaid,” “Cinderella” and “Robin Hood” as cherished favorites.
“‘Charlotte’s Web’ is also children’s entertainment, which attempts to talk about death and loss,” he explained.
For many youngsters the coronavirus pandemic has changed their world, or at the very least, their general world-view.
Some children may have lost family members or friends to the virus, and just about all facets of daily life have been upended because of it.

“The play is about friendship and what it costs, and about what being in the community costs,” Pfeiffer said.
The storytelling aspect of “Charlotte’s Web” and its narrative form should be a natural fit for the festival’s first staged outdoor performance, he said.
“It’s the first time PSF has ever done this,” Pfeiffer said.
“Charlotte’s Web” is the story of a young farm girl named Fern Arable, who adopts a piglet “runt” and names him Wilbur. The piglet grows into a prize-winning pig, while his friend Charlotte, a spider who lives in a barn doorway, devises a plan to keep Wilbur from being slaughtered.
The story is about the power friendship, trust, loyalty, risk-taking and the rhythmic cycles of life and death.
As much of the story describes outdoor sights and sounds as it takes place in a barn and farmyard, Pfeiffer said performing in an outdoor environment should be an enhancement for audiences.
“‘Charlotte’s Web’ is open-hearted and celebratory. It’s about talking animals and fun in the barn, but it’s also about people uncertain about reentering into the world,” he explained.
A story of friendship and community, and how we take care of one another, Pfeiffer said the show’s themes are particularly resonant since COVID-19.
“I can’t think of a better time to share this story,” he said.

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