Shakespeare in the Park Shows Set for This Summer

The Public Theater 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 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 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.