Shakespeare’s Globe 2013 season

We are gathered on the wooden stage of The Globe in front of artistic director Dominic Dromgoole, who announces what the theatre has in store for us in its summer season commencing in May.

Entitled a Season of Plenty, and rightly so, it will open with Jeremy Herrin’s production of The Tempest on 23^rd April. Here, Prospero will be played by Roger Allam, who won the Best Actor Olivier Award for his interpretation of Falstaff at the same venue in Henry IV Parts 1 & 2. Colin Morgan (recently the eponymous Merlin in the hit BBC series) makes his Globe debut as Ariel, and Jessie Buckley (of Lloyd Webber’s BBC talent show, I’d Do Anything), is Miranda.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, opening in May, will be directed by Dromgoole himself, starring Michelle Terry as Titania, who was last at The Globe in Love Labour’s Lost in 2012. In June, Eve Best will make her directorial debut with Macbeth, the title role being taken by Joseph Millson.

The Globe will also be touring all three parts of Henry VI (Harry The Sixth, The Houses of York and Lancaster, and The True Tragedy Of The Duke Of York), starting at the York Theatre Royal. The tour will include exciting performances at the historic battle sites of the Wars of the Roses, with involvement of re-enactment troops. Nick Bagnall will be the director of this project.

In support of new writing, the Globe will host three world premieres in 2013. Gabriel will be a ground-breaking musical and theatrical event, directed by Dromgoole and involving the work of eminent trumpet soloist Alison Balsom (Female Artist of the Year at the Classic BRIT Awards, twice). She treated us to a performance of 17^th century music, and the acoustics fed on the sound joyfully. Gabriel promises to be a very innovative and exciting outing.

Jessica Swale’s debut Blue Stockings is an eye-opening tale of the first female students of Cambridge University, and the prejudices they faced and overcame. This is perfectly timed politically, alongside the tragic case of Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in late 2012 by the Taliban for wanting to attend school.

The Globe will close the season with Ché Walker’s adaptation on Euripides’ The Bacchae, entitled The Lightening Child, directed by Matthew Dunster and with songs by Arthur Darvill.

Small scale tours will take place internationally and within the UK, including King Lear, directed by Bill Buckhurst, and an all-female The Taming of The Shrew, directed by Joe Murphy. Joseph Marcell (best known as Geoffrey in The Fresh Prince of Bel Air) will play Lear.

Last year’s Globe to Globe festival saw 52 plays performed in 52 different languages with theatre companies invited from all over the world, attracting an array of audiences to the venue. This legacy lives on into 2013, with some companies returning to the Globe. Isango Ensemble from South Africa bring Venus and Adonis, Marjanishvili Theatre from Georgia return with As You Like It, and Belarus Free Theatre reprise their provocative take on King Lear. The international schedule finishes with Footsbarn Theatre Company, who return on tour with a carnival mix of street theatre, mime and circus in Indian Tempest.

The Globe continues its backing of London’s famous drama schools on 7^th April with an afternoon of Shakespearean duologues as part of The Sam Wanamaker Festival, where schools are invited to showcase two graduating students in a scene of their choice. Students are given the opportunity to perform on a prestigious stage, as well as practise their craft in front of an enormous audience.

Shakespeare’s Globe, with Dromgoole at the helm, inspires and fills a 1700-seat theatre with immense regularity because of its diverse, inspirational look at old and new works. The 2013 season promises nothing less – 400 years exactly since the day the original Globe Theatre burned down, it is set alight again with talent and promising productions. If you’re not planning on a trip to London’s South Bank this spring/summer, we implore you to think again.

Sarah Milton

For further information or to book visit the Globe’s website here.