Second, the productions are top-notch, with superb direction, casting, and design. After a rough patch during the past few years, OSF is back on its feet. Tim Bond, who was associate artistic director from 1996 to 2007, has returned as artistic director. he lives in Ashland and has strong community ties, as well as good working relationships with many of the directors and actors who have made OSF such a great festival over the years.

For the current season, he has brought back some of the audience's favorite actors, including Kevin Kenerly, Erica Sullivan, Kate Hurster, David Kelly, Jennie Greenberry, Rodney Gardiner, Robin Goodrin Nordli, Rex Young, Vilma Silva, John Tufts, Barzin Akhavan, and Amy Kim Waschke. Seeing the same actor do an outstanding job in completely different roles is one of the joys of attending several plays at OSF.

Third, the audiences are the best. I've attended co-productions between OSF and Seattle Rep, and found that the Seattle Rep audience was more impatient and less attentive. It makes sense: they live locally and need to get up early the next day for a job or household responsibilities. In Ashland, the audience is there for theater, period. And even though the resident population is predominantly white, OSF's social justice initiatives (championed by Bond and others) have led to diversity in casting, which in turn has attracted a diverse audience.

Finally, even if you're not a theater nerd, Ashland is a delightful, Queer-friendly town, the only place in notoriously right-wing Southern Oregon where most of us can feel comfortable.

If you stay in a hotel there, you can park your car for the duration of your stay and walk to performances, meals, shops, and galleries. There are a couple of beautiful parks right in town too, including Lithia Park adjacent to the festival grounds. If you prefer to camp, Emigrant Lake County Park is a lovely spot for your tent or RV.

What's in store for this season
In the medium-sized indoor Angus Bowmer Theatre, two plays are already running: William Shakespeare's Macbeth, which requires no introduction, and Born with Teeth, a new comedy by Liz Duffy Adams that envisions a testy collaboration between Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe.

In the intimate Thomas Theatre, three one-person shows currently take turns: until May 4, Lisa Wolpe's Shakespeare and the Alchemy of Gender; until May 12, Rodney Gardiner's Smote This: A Comedy about God and Other Serious $H*T; and opening on May 16, Robin Goodrin Nordli's Virgins to Villains: My Journey with Shakespeare's Women.

In the large outdoor Allen Elizabethan Theatre, two plays will open in early June and run through mid-October: Shakespeare's comedy Much Ado about Nothing and a stage adaptation of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre.

Over the summer, three additional plays will open in the Thomas Theatre: the indie-rock musical Lizard Boy, starting on June 11; Shakespeare's Coriolanus, beginning July 23 with an all-women cast; and Barzin Akhavan's one-person play Behfarmaheen (if you please), about his experience immigrating to the US from Iran, opening July 31.