The Bard Comes to Park Avenue

The Royal Shakespeare Company has announced a six-week, five-play residency at the Park Avenue Armory for summer 2011. The run, part of the Lincoln Center Festival, is scheduled to last from July 6 to Aug. 14, 2011, and will feature 45 performances of five Shakespeare plays, which will be selected from the company"s 2009 and 2010 repertoire:ˆ  Antony and Cleopatra,ˆ  As You Like It, Julius Caesar, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet and The Winter"s Tale. As part of the residency, an exact replica of the company"s new Royal Shakespeare Theater will be constructed as a self-supporting structure inside the armory"s Wade Thompson Drill Hall. In a press release, armory president and CEO Rebecca Robertson said, â??The armory enables artists and performers to realize great works of art and epic productions that otherwise could not be seen in New York. â??We are proudˆ to be bringing to the festival one of the world"s most important theater companies, said Nigel Redden, director of Lincoln Center Festival, in a statement.ˆ â??Lincoln Center Festival is happy to join with these exceptional organizations to bring Americans, and New Yorkers in particular, this unique opportunity to experience Shakespeare"s plays performed by an ensemble of actors whom they will get to know over the course of watching five different productions. According to festival officials, the 930-seat auditorium will feature three levels of seating, with the farthest seat a mere 49 feet away from the stage. The residency itself will require 44 actors, 23 musicians and 30 other creative artists.