Playbill - The Todd Theatre Festival of 1934

Playbill - The Todd Theatre Festival of 1934

When the traveling theatre circuits disappeared in the early 20th century, the Woodstock Opera House became the site for the Chicago-area's first, however short-lived, summer stock theatre - The Todd Theatre Festival of 1934. The six-week summer theatre festival was organized by Todd School’s headmaster Roger Hill and Orson Welles (a 1931 graduate of Todd School). Three plays were presented at the Woodstock Opera House — Trilby, Hamlet and Tsar Paul — featuring Welles, Hilton Edwards and Micheál MacLiammóir of Dublin's Gate Theatre, Louise Prussing, Charles O'Neal and Constance Heron.

The stage of the Woodstock Opera House was dedicated to Welles in 2013, and the Woodstock Opera House hosted an 80th anniversary celebration of the Todd Theatre Festival.

The famous actor and director, Orson Welles, is the best-known Todd School graduate. He started at Todd School in 1926 and graduated in 1931 at age 15. In the summer of 1934, he returned to produce the Todd Theatre Festival of Shakespearean plays at the Opera House.

Welles’ first known film, Hearts of Age, was filmed in Woodstock. The building seen in the film is Wallingford Hall on the school campus. The Todd School bell used in the film now resides in front of the Woodstock Presbyterian Church, and the gravestone is in the Calvary Cemetery on Jackson Street.

Welles is perhaps best known for directing and starring in Citizen Kane. In another of his movies, The Stranger, set in a boys’ boarding school, Welles paid homage by including subtle references to Todd School.

Welles was a frequent visitor to the school after graduating, and would eventually serve on the Todd School board and his daughter, Christopher, attended the school. Welles remained friends with Roger Hill, Todd School Headmaster, and the two men collaborated on the Everybody’s Shakespeare.

1934