Following the success of last summer's Shakespeare in the Park productions of The Merchant of Venice and The Winter's Tale, The Public Theater (Artistic Director Oskar Eustis; Executive Director Andrew D. Hamingson) will once again stage two Shakespeare plays in repertory, running June 6 through July 31 at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. Daniel Sullivan, who recently directed Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice in the Park, will direct ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL and David Esbjornson, who directed Much Ado About Nothing in the Park, will direct MEASURE FOR MEASURE. Bank of America returns as lead sponsor of Shakespeare in the Park 2011, supporting The Public's mission to keep Shakespeare in the Park free.
"Last year's Shakespeare rep was a thrilling success; the current run of The Merchant of Venice on Broadway is a wonderful reminder of what made last summer so magical," said
Public Theater Artistic Director
Oskar Eustis. "This year, two of Shakespeare's richest and most rewarding plays make up our season. We are delighted that once again an American Shakespeare company will light up New York's summer."
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL is a fairytale for grown-ups. This beguiling fable follows the low-born Helena, one of Shakespeare's most resourceful heroines, as she inventively surmounts obstacle after impossible obstacle in order to win the love of the aristocratic and haughty Count Bertram.
MEASURE FOR MEASURE sweeps from the corridors of national power to the intimate confines of the bedroom, and from the convent's chapel to the executioner's block. It is Shakespeare at his grittiest: a bracing and bawdy glimpse of what happens when those in power allow their basest human impulses to range unchecked.
ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL (last staged in the Park in 1993) and MEASURE FOR MEASURE (last staged in the Park in 2001) are as enthralling, theatrical, and transporting as any work in the canon. Together the two plays offer an extraordinary sense of Shakespeare's scope and power, humor and insight. Their vivid characters, searingly intense emotions, magnificent flights of metaphor, and riveting stories will showcase a thrilling Central Park season of American Shakespeare of the highest caliber.
Daniel Sullivan (Director). For
The Public Theater, Sullivan directed The Merchant of Venice (Broadway/Shakespeare in the Park), Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Stuff Happens, and The Merry Wives of Windsor. Among his Broadway credits are Time Stands Still, Accent on Youth, The Homecoming, Prelude to a Kiss, Rabbit Hole, After the Night and the Music, Julius Caesar,
Brooklyn Boy, Sight Unseen, I'm Not Rappaport, Morning's at Seven, Proof, the 2000 production of A Moon for the Misbegotten, Ah, Wilderness!, The Sisters Rosensweig, Conversations With My Father, and The Heidi Chronicles. Among his off-Broadway credits are Intimate Apparel, Far East, Spinning into Butter, Dinner With Friends, and The Substance of Fire. From 1981 to 1997, he served as Artistic Director of
Seattle Repertory Theatre. Sullivan is the Swanlund Professor of Theatre at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
David Esbjornson (Director) has been the Artistic Director at Seattle Repertory and
Classic Stage Company in New York. Highlights include: In the Blood by
Suzan-Lori Parks (The Public), the world premiere of Purgatorio by
Ariel Dorfman (Seattle Rep), The Goat or Who is Sylvia? (Broadway), The Play About the Baby (The Century), The Ride Down Mt. Morgan and Resurrection Blues by
Arthur Miller (Broadway, The Guthrie), the world premiere of Angels in America: Millennium Approaches and the first public presentation of Perestroika, Homebody/Kabul (London),
Neal Bell's Thérèse Raquin (CSC; OBIE), Tuesdays With Morrie (Minetta Lane) and
Kevin Kling's How? How? Why? Why? Why?. Favorite revivals include: The Normal Heart (The Public), Hamlet (Theatre For A New Audience; OBIE), A Few Good Men (Royale Haymarket-London), All My Sons (Huntington), Much Ado About Nothing (NYSF), Mud and Drowning (Signature), Endgame (Drama Desk Nomination), The Maids, Entertaining Mr. Sloane (
Lucille Lortel Award), The Entertainer (CSC), Farmyard (NYTW), Who's Afraid of
Virginia Woolf?, Summer and Smoke (Guthrie), Twelfth Night and Lady From Dubuque (Seattle Repertory).
The Public Theater (
Oskar Eustis, Artistic Director;
Andrew D. Hamingson, Executive Director) was founded by
Joseph Papp in 1954 and is now one of the nation's preeminent cultural institutions, producing new plays, musicals, and productions of classics at its downtown headquarters and at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. The Public's mandate to create a theater for all New Yorkers continues to this day onstage and through extensive outreach and education programs. Each year, over 250,000 people attend
Public Theater-related productions and events at six downtown stages, including Joe's Pub, and Shakespeare in the Park. The Public has won 42 Tony Awards, 151 Obies, 41 Drama Desk Awards and four Pulitzer Prizes. The Public has brought 54 shows to Broadway, including Sticks and Bones; That Championship Season; A Chorus Line; The Pirates of Penzance; The Tempest; Bring In ‘Da Noise, Bring In ‘Da Funk; On the Town; The Ride Down Mt. Morgan; Topdog/Underdog;
Elaine Stritch at Liberty; Take Me Out; Caroline, or Change; Well; Passing Strange; the Tony Award-winning revival of Hair; Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson; and currently, the 2010 Shakespeare in the Park production of The Merchant of Venice. for more information, visit
www.publictheater.org.
BANK OF AMERICA CORPORATE PHILANTHROPY. Building on a long-standing tradition of investing in the communities it serves, Bank of America is delivering on a 10-year goal to donate $2 billion to nonprofit organizations engaged in improving the health and vitality of their neighborhoods. Funded by Bank of America, the Bank of America Charitable Foundation gave more than $200 million in 2010, making the bank one of the largest corporate cash donors in the United States. As a global company doing business in more than 100 countries, Bank of America approaches investing through a national strategy under which it works with local leaders to identify and meet the most pressing needs of individual communities. Reaffirming a commitment to develop and sustain a culture of service, bank associate volunteers contributed more than one million hours in 2010 to enhance the quality of life in their communities worldwide. For more information about Bank of America Corporate Philanthropy, visit
www.bankofamerica.com/foundation.
