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Renaissance Festival
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| AZ Renaissance Festival prepares for 20th year | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| By Michael Grady, Get Out | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| February 8, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Halfway through his opening speech, King Henry pauses. From atop the village gates he looks out on his subjects and the Superstition Mountains beyond. SLIDESHOW - In preparation for the 20th Annual Arizona Renaissance Festival. Below him, a crowd of dapper lords, sequined ladies, bishops, beggars and peasants hang upon his next word. King Henry taps his jeweled fingers, tugs his ermine robe, then turns to the Lord Mayor and declares: “You know, I forgot my line.” His subjects collapse into laughter and jeers, taunting their fellow actor as a stage manager slips him a page. “Sorry, sorry,” he tells the crowd. “Working off last year’s script.” BETWEEN THE CANNONS Tomorrow morning, when the cannon sounds, the king will open the Arizona Renaissance Festival for real. The mythical town of Fairhaven, a Renaissance-era “Brigadoon,” will bloom again in the scrub near Apache Junction. Each day visitors will wander through a world of jousting, feasting, courtly pageantry, medieval tomfoolery and history to see, touch and taste. Producer Jeffrey Siegel says Fairhaven, like everything around A.J., is growing like gangbusters.
“This is the largest Renaissance Festival in the Southwest now,” Siegel says on a drizzly Super Bowl Sunday morning. A cold wind buffets 250 performers gathered for their orientation in velvet robes, low-cut gowns and period tights. It looks like a Bruegel painting, attending a community college class. Local performers include adventurous students and reliable vets like Butch Brown, a Bank of America employee who commutes to the 16th century on weekends. “This is my 10th year as Lord Mayor,” he explains. Attired in a velvet Rembrandt hat and an ornate swath of robes, Brown attacks his role with zeal. “I welcome each and every one of the patrons to the festival,” he says. “I give ’em a hearty ‘huzzah,’ direct them toward things to see do, and tell them to play heartily. And I promise the ladies there will be plenty of men in tights.” LIVING HISTORY — AND MEAT The festival balances a jester’s sensibility with the sights, smells and customs of a very different world.
“We have a whole story line behind our act,” says Carrie Konyha. This morning, in the chilly shadow of the Superstitions, she’s a Sedona-based belly dancer, warming up her Nawari dance troupe. But “between the cannons”: “We’re traveling gypsies, working the trade route, entertaining people along the way.” The shy might prefer spending time with Croft, a Renaissance-era re-enactment group that creates and demonstrates period clothing. “It’s fun,” Stephen Hughes of Mesa says, watching as a companion is meticulously folded into a Scottish bedroll/cloak/kilt called a “plaid.” “It’s living history,” he explains. “If you can see and touch things the way people used them, it makes history a lot more interesting than what you learned in school.” And if learning isn’t your thing on a weekend, Siegel reminds us there are plenty of roasted turkey legs. “Forget about your car payment, or your dental appointment, and leave your cares behind. That’s what ‘huzzah!’ means — good old medieval cheer.” << Back to Renaissance Festival Guide Contact Michael Grady by email, or phone (480) 898-6572 |
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Reader comments (1)
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alyssa
how do you sign up for the renaissance fairs. I have always wanted to volunteer for one. But i dont know how. Can you please tell me how????????? Suggest removal of this commentMarch 12, 2008