Roger Rees Joins Orlando Shakespeare Company Lineup

Tony Award-winning actor Roger Rees has joined the lineup for the Orlando Shakespeare Company's upcoming season, replacing the previously announced Brian Bedford. He'll be performing his one-man show, WHAT YOU WILL, on February 29.

"We are thrilled to have Roger to join us for this special evening, and we fully expect to see Brian Bedford perform at Orlando Shakes in the future," Jim Helsinger, artistic director of the Orlando Shakes told the Orlando Sentinel. 

Rees joined THE ADDAMS FAMILY on Broadway this past March, immediately after he had co-directed with Alex Timbers the acclaimed production of Peter and the Starcatcher, written by Rick Elice, at the New York Theatre Workshop. THE ADDAMS FAMILY closes on December 31.

He began his career with the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he created the title role in the legendary production of The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, for which he received the Olivier Award in London and the Tony Award in New York. Other New York credits include the Flaherty/Ahrens musical A Man of No Importance for Lincoln Center Theater (Mitzi Newhouse); Indiscretions, for which he was nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards as Best Actor, and the Roundabout productions of Uncle Vanya and The Rehearsal. Off-Broadway he starred in The End of the Day (for which he received an Obie Award) and The Uneasy Chair at Playwrights Horizons; also, The Misanthrope at Classic Stage Company. In London, he starred in the original productions of Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing and Hapgood; Double, Double; and for the RSC, as Hamlet, Love's Labour's Lost, Cymbeline, Much Ado About Nothing and The Suicide. Last year, he appeared with Ian McKellen in the acclaimed West End production of Waiting for Godot at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. Television credits include Cheers, Warehouse 13 and The West Wing.