I was first enamored of combining my two passions, theater and travel, when I spent five days in Dublin, Ireland, with a bookclub, in 2008.  It wasn’t even “my” bookclub, but I met the leader at a party and she invited me to join the group.  Having never been to Dublin, I thought, why not? When my boss, the executive director of the theater where I was currently Director of Development heard about my plans, she said she would like to join me…and by the way, did I know that the Dublin Theater Festival was going on while we would be there? I didn’t – but when I looked it up, I was fascinated by the myriad choices of performances and booked as many as I could possibly fit into a five day jaunt. We never saw the bookclub members, but we did see two performances a day and three shows on one day (which made it really hard to remember which one was which!). We toured Dublin’s historical sites, ate food that surpassed any ideas of “Irish food”, drank numerous pints and Irish coffees and saw fresh new works as well as classics. I was hooked. Travel and theater – that is what I want to do!

And luckily, for the past ten years, I have been doing exactly that! First at Marin Theatre Company and then at American Conservatory Theater and now at Dramarama Theater Tours. Starting with a small group of tourees to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, I added different venues each year. Tours included the Shaw and Stratford Theater Festivals in Canada, the Dublin Theater Festival, New York City and one year I had 36 tourees be my New Year’s date in London. After each tour I always think, how can I top that one? And somehow, each year, each tour, becomes a very special theater/travel/group experience.

Why? Yes, it is the immersion in the world of theater and seeing a show every night. But I think these two reasons are paramount to the success of Dramarama Theater Tours.

1) Each tour meets with guest artists in discussions led by knowledgeable artistic guides, who also lead post-show discussions. So far this tour season we met with four artistic directors (Aurora Theatre, Berkeley Rep, SF Playhouse and ACT) on the Valentine weekend tour and at OSF we met an understudy for a one man show about August Wilson, plus an actor in the cast of unseen. On the Dublin Theatre Festival tour we met three actors from the cast of Joyce’s Women, the artistic director of the Festival, Willie White and Fishamble Theatre Company’s artistic director, Jim Cullington, after seeing the show he directed, Heaven. And as a surprise, on our backstage and on stage tour of the Abbey Theatre, we met one of the actors from the cast of Whistle in the Dark. Each discussion brought us more understanding of the thought and creative talent that is behind the scenes in “putting on a show.”

2) And the big one: the patrons on Dramarama tours are theater aficionados. They love theater. They attend theater. They enjoy talking about theater and sharing their opinions about theater. Somehow, every. single. time. the group becomes a family of wine drinking, joyful laughing, discussion hungry theater critics.

I invite you to join a Dramarama Theater Tour this coming year. I am planning a New York tour of “on and off” Broadway shows in April 2023, possibly a Canada festival tour and my tried and true forever in love with Ireland – the Dublin Theatre Festival in the fall of 2023. All tours are singles-friendly (with a low single supplement and optional group meals). Although this website has information about the tours, there are always changes and additions that make the tour you go on super special!

Get your bivalent “shot” so we can, once again, share those magical moments of travel and theater.

Email helen@dramaramatours.com or call 510-778-1877 and let’s chat about the possibilities.