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"We are proud to be bringing to the festival one of the world's most important theater companies," Redden said Monday of the troupe of 44 actors, 23 musicians and another 30 staff who will cross the Atlantic for the summer engagement.
The 45 shows will include five Shakespeare plays from the company's current repertory of "Antony and Cleopatra," As You Like It," "Julius Caesar," "King Lear," "Romeo and Juliet," and "A Winter's Tale."
The company is among the most important subsidized by the British government and has its base in the famous playwright's hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon, as well as two theatres, in London and Newcastle. Its repertory includes Shakespeare works as well as those of contemporary playwrights.
Its artistic director Michael Boyd is known for nontraditional Shakespeare adaptations, which since 2003 have aimed to bring Shakespeare to all kinds of crowds, particularly young people.
Though the company often comes to New York, this time it has something special along for the ride: a life-size replica of the traditional theatre in the round that reopens this year in Stratford-upon-Avon. The theatre will be set up inside a sprawling Manhattan armory.
The wooden replica from England will be pieced together in the Park Avenue Drill Hall Armory, a 55,000-square-foot facility on the elegant New York avenue, and will include a "thrust stage" extending the performance platform into the audience.
Boyd said that "wrapping the audience around the action allows people to reach out to our actors and to each other in a space which is both intimate and powerful."
"I am delighted that we can recreate that intimacy right here in New York city," he added.
The facility will have 930 seats on three levels. And the plays, organizers say, will make masterful use of 425 costumes, 350 pairs of shoes, 20 wigs, 15 mustaches, four prosthetic devices and 20 liters (five gallons) of fake blood.
The shows, cosponsored by Ohio State University, will be staged between July 6 and August 14 2011 at the Lincoln Center's summer festival, which has been held in New York since 1996.
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The 45 shows will include five Shakespeare plays from the company's current repertory of "Antony and Cleopatra," As You Like It," "Julius Caesar," "King Lear," "Romeo and Juliet," and "A Winter's Tale."
The company is among the most important subsidized by the British government and has its base in the famous playwright's hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon, as well as two theatres, in London and Newcastle. Its repertory includes Shakespeare works as well as those of contemporary playwrights.
Its artistic director Michael Boyd is known for nontraditional Shakespeare adaptations, which since 2003 have aimed to bring Shakespeare to all kinds of crowds, particularly young people.
Though the company often comes to New York, this time it has something special along for the ride: a life-size replica of the traditional theatre in the round that reopens this year in Stratford-upon-Avon. The theatre will be set up inside a sprawling Manhattan armory.
The wooden replica from England will be pieced together in the Park Avenue Drill Hall Armory, a 55,000-square-foot facility on the elegant New York avenue, and will include a "thrust stage" extending the performance platform into the audience.
Boyd said that "wrapping the audience around the action allows people to reach out to our actors and to each other in a space which is both intimate and powerful."
"I am delighted that we can recreate that intimacy right here in New York city," he added.
The facility will have 930 seats on three levels. And the plays, organizers say, will make masterful use of 425 costumes, 350 pairs of shoes, 20 wigs, 15 mustaches, four prosthetic devices and 20 liters (five gallons) of fake blood.
The shows, cosponsored by Ohio State University, will be staged between July 6 and August 14 2011 at the Lincoln Center's summer festival, which has been held in New York since 1996.
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