image description — The cast of BTG PLAYS 'Magic Tree House: Pirates Past Noon.' Photo by Katie Watts.

BTG PLAYS presents 'Magic Tree House' Musical

03:09PM / Tuesday, February 11, 2020Print Story | Email Story

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Berkshire Theatre Group will present the BTG PLAYS 2019-2020 Touring Show, "Magic Tree House: Pirates Past Noon," based on the book "Magic Tree House: Pirates Past Noon" by Mary Pope Osborne, at The Colonial Theatre on Saturday, Feb. 22, at 2 p.m., as part of the 10x10 Upstreet Arts Festival.

There will be a book signing with Mary Pope Osborne from 1 to 1:45 p.m. in The Colonial Theatre lobby prior to the performance. Books will be available for purchase, provided by The Bookstore in Lenox.

This musical features a book by Jenny Laird and Will Osborne, lyrics by Randy Courts and Will Osborne and music by Randy Courts, with direction by Travis Daly. "Magic Tree House: Pirates Past Noon" is an adaptation of the fourth of Pope Osborne's award-winning fantasy adventure books from the "Magic Tree House" book series, which has sold more than 100 million copies and is available in more than a hundred countries around the world.

The two siblings return to visit the magic tree house on a dreary, rainy day. They find a book where the sun is shining and the waves are crashing, so they wish to travel to this tropical place. They realize that they are in the 18th-century Caribbean—the time of pirates! The siblings meet Captain Bones, a mean old pirate who captures the two and forces them to help him find buried treasure. It's up to Jack and Annie to find their way back to the tree house and make their way home.

BTG PLAYS Touring Show is a part of Berkshire Theatre Group's year-round education program, which reaches 13,000 school children annually. Beginning in October and running through the school year, this production is appropriate for elementary and middle school aged children and family audiences, and is designed to introduce students to the excitement of live theatre. The tour travels to schools and venues all throughout Berkshire County and surrounding towns with a local company of artists, and a question and answer session with the actors follows each performance.

Tags: books, family event, theater,

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Tina Packer, Founder of Shakespeare & Company, Dies at 87

Staff Reports 06:51PM / Saturday, January 10, 2026

LENOX, Mass. — The doyenne of Shakespeare's plays, Tina Packer, died Friday at the age of 87.

Shakespeare & Company, which Packer co-founded in 1978, made the announcement Saturday on its Facebook page.

"It is with profound sadness that we announce the passing of Tina Packer, Shakespeare & Company's founding artistic director and acclaimed director, actor, writer, and teacher," the company said on its post and in a press release.

Packer, who retired a the theater company's artistic director in 2009, had directed all of Shakespeare's plays, some several times, acted in eight of them, and taught the whole canon at more than 30 colleges, including Harvard. She continued to direct, teach, and advocate for the company until her passing.

At Columbia University, she taught in the master of business administration program for four years, resulting in the publication of "Power Plays: Shakespeare's Lessons in Leadership and Management with Deming Professor John Whitney" for Simon and Schuster. For Scholastic, she wrote "Tales from Shakespeare," a children's book and recipient of the Parent's Gold Medal Award.

Most recently her book "Women of Will" was published by Knopf and she had been performing "Women of Will" with Nigel Gore, in New York, Mexico, England, The Hague, China, and across the United States. She's the recipient of numerous awards and honorary degrees, including the Commonwealth Award.

"Our hearts are heavy with the passing of Tina Packer, a fiery force of nature with an indomitable spirit," said Artistic Director Allyn Burrows. "Tina affected everyone she encountered with her warmth, generosity, wit, and insatiable curiosity. She delighted in people's stories, and reached into their hearts with tender humanity. The world was her stage, and she furthered the Berkshires as a destination for the imagination.

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