Festivals return to Hawrelak Park following 3-year absence for renovations

The Freewill Shakespeare Festival will be the first festival to happen at the revamped Hawrelak Park. CTV News Edmonton's Curtis Goodrum has the story.

They’re ba-ack.

And at least two managers of festivals held annually in the city’s largest central park say they’re very glad to be able to stage them there once again after three years.

The Freewill Shakespeare Festival will be the first festival to grace William Hawrelak Park starting Wednesday since it reopened last month.

The City of Edmonton had closed it for $134.5 million in extensive rehabilitation work, including to underground infrastructure, buildings, structures and landscaping.

The city relocated several festivals that usually call Hawrelak Park home during renovations.

The Shakespeare fest was held in several different places: in a tent on the Edmonton Expo Centre grounds one summer, at Louise McKinney Park another year, and in empty outdoor hockey rinks at various community leagues around the city for a third season.

“It’s been a bit of an adventure to get back here,” David Horak, the artistic director of the festival, told CTV News Edmonton on Tuesday.

“Here” is the Heritage Amphitheatre, which, like the rest of the park, saw several upgrades.

“It’s just like any renovation when you first move into that new renovated home, there are always a few things where you’re, like, ‘Where are the plugins? How does this work? Where should we put these kinds of things?’” Horak said. “There’s a big learning curve, and we knew coming back that we would be the test festival to try and figure out how things work, and most everything’s working.”

For the Silver Skate Festival’s Erin Diloreto, there’s “a lot of excitement” among those who frequent the wintertime celebration outdoors for the return across the river to Hawrelak from Wilfred Laurier Park.

“I have gotten more international interest this year than I think I have for the last six years combined,” Diloreto said Tuesday.

The festival features several activities each February and has included sculpture artists, storytelling, roving performers, food, lantern crafting, art installations, winter cinema, building with snow blocks, and winter activities such as skating, ball and broom hockey, sledge hockey and riding ice bikes.

The Freewill Shakespeare Festival will stage two productions this season: first, Much Ado About Nothing, starting Thursday for two weeks, then Something Rotten!, which is slated to run July 1-12.

It’s a different format than previous years, when the festival would rotate two productions day by day.

“They’re separate shows,” Horak said. “Old audiences might remember, ‘Oh, I could come and see a show on the matinee, and then the evening show I could see a different show.’ You can’t do that this year.”

The Edmonton Heritage Festival, which is held annually over the August long weekend, will also return this year Aug. 1-3. It is typically the city’s best-attended festival and typically draws 350,000-400,000 people each year.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Curtis Goodrum