A new ‘Tempest’ and a new stage launch the Elm Shakespeare Company’s return to Edgerton Park

New Haven’s Elm Shakespeare Company is launching its first full-scale summer production since the beginning of the pandemic. “The Tempest” opens Aug. 18 and runs through Sept. 4 at Edgerton Park, where the state’s largest outdoor Shakespeare company has performed nearly every summer for more than a quarter of a century, drawing tens of thousands of people.

“The Tempest” was actually the first outdoor summer production that the Elm Shakespeare Company did at Edgerton Park, in 1996, and then again in 2003, both under the leadership of the company’s founder James Andreassi. This third rendition will be directed by Rebecca Goodheart, who became the company’s artistic director in 2015.

“In today’s world full of division and struggling with justice, this play offers hope,” said Goodheart in a statement. “How do we find a way through the unquestionable wrongs that others have done? How do we manage our own–often justified–anger and hurt? What must we do to settle the past, for our children to have a chance in the world? How do we find reconciliation?”

The play, a literally turbulent tale of worlds and societies and families in crisis, with a natural disaster as a backdrop, has proven quite popular during the COVID era. It has many dark, scary moments, but also a lot of comic routines thanks to such fantastical characters as Ariel and Caliban.

The Globe Theater in London and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival are among the many theaters that have chosen to perform “The Tempest” this year. The Connecticut-based movement and dance troupe Pilobolus is involved with a “Tempest” this fall presented by the Folger Shakespeare Library and Round House Theatre in Washington D.C., co-directed by the well-known playwright Aaron Posner and Teller of the magic team Penn & Teller and featuring an original music score by Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan.

Despite not being able to do its usual massive outdoor productions for two years, the company has not been dormant. Last summer, instead of the usual professional Shakespeare show, the company held a youth theater festival in Edgerton Park with several different young ensembles doing revised contemporary versions of Shakespeare stories. The year before that, the company offered an array of virtual performances and talks that connected Shakespearean themes to current events.

Elm Shakespeare returns to large-scale productions in a better place than it was a couple of years ago, thanks to a gift from Alexander Clark, CEO of the New Haven-based software development company Technolutions. After years of building lavish sprawling multi-level sets from scratch every year, the donation has allowed the company to create a grand new stage area that can be disassembled, stored and moved. There’s even the potential to use the stage in other locations.

The new structure, called the Alexander Clark Playhouse Stage, will debut with “The Tempest.” It consists of a subfloor, a large stage platform area and a multi-level building-like performance area.

The new set-up will “allow us to be much more innovative,” said Liz Smith, Elm Shakespeare’s communications and public relations director.

“The Tempest” by William Shakespeare will be performed Aug. 18 through Sept. 4 at Edgerton Park, 75 Cliff Street, New Haven. Performances are Tuesday through Sunday at 7:30 p.m. Free; suggested donation is $25 for adults. elmshakespeare.org.

Christopher Arnott can be reached at carnott@courant.com.