Drama and Dance Department Collection

Begun in 1950, Hofstra University’s Annual Shakespeare Festival is the longest continuously running college festival of its kind in the United States. The Festival’s earliest plays featured professional actors, but performances have long since featured students from the University’s Drama and Dance Department. Many Festival programs have been staged on a five-sixth reproduction of London’s Globe Theatre, the construction of which was based on a model of the Globe created by John Cranford Adams, President of Hofstra University from 1944 to 1964 and a noted Shakespeare scholar. A number of Festival performers have gone on to successful careers in television and on Broadway.