Denice Hicks in a Nashville Shakespeare Festival production of Cymbeline, August 2022
Big news for the Nashville theater community, and the community in general: Nashville Shakespeare Festival’s longtime artistic executive director Denice Hicks announced that, after more than 30 years with the organization, she’ll be stepping down from her role in September.
“It has been such a privilege to serve in this capacity, and after seeing the astounding growth we've experienced over the past several years, I have decided that it’s a good year for me to step down as the artistic leader of the company and turn my attention back to my own creative path,” Hicks says in a Wednesday press release.
Among Hicks’ achievements at NSF are:
- Maintaining the annual free Summer Shakespeare productions attended by hundreds of thousands of community members.
- Partnering with the Nashville Public Library to create the ongoing monthly Shakespeare Allowed! project and the annual Apprentice Company program, which has trained over 300 theater artists since 1999. (An additional accomplishment is that Hicks has dedicated more than 150 Saturdays to the free and monthly Shakespeare Allowed! series, helping to ensure the organization's accessibility to the community.)
- Directing or or assistant-directing 18 productions.
- Editing and directing NSF’s Educational programming since 1992.
- Acting in 23 mainstage productions.
An NSF press release also notes that, under Hicks' leadership, the festival “began as a group of local actors and theater enthusiasts and has now grown to an organization with seven full-time staff and hiring an average of 108 artists and technicians a year.”
Read Hicks’ additional comments below, and see a selection of photographs of her in various NSF productions throughout the years.
As the Executive Artistic Director for this theater company, I have been focused on creating as many jobs as possible in every season and assuring the best quality productions possible. The community that is the Festival — the staff and board, volunteers and patrons, casts and crews — have created something for which Nashville and the state of Tennessee can be very proud. The current team, under the leadership of Executive Managing Director Isabel Tipton-Krispin and Board Chair Char Dennis, is exceptional, and I have full confidence in their ability to keep the Festival growing and thriving.
I am grateful for the years I was entrusted with the Festival’s mission and will continue to support the company in any way I can. I will always believe in the relevance of Shakespeare through the ages and the power of theatre to change lives, and look forward to participating in and attending future Festival events. As Hamlet said, “If it be now tis not to come. If it is not to come, it will be now. If it be not now yet, it will come. The readiness is all.”
