Globe announces return of Mark Rylance, 2012 Theatre Season and ambitious touring plans Friday 2 December 2011 Artistic Director Dominic Dromgoole and Shakespeare’s Globe welcomes back multi award-winning actor Mark Rylance to perform in its 2012 Theatre Season The Play’s The Thing. This will be the first time that Rylance has appeared on the Globe stage since his tenure as Artistic Director between 1995 and 2005. The main theatre season, which begins on 7 June 2012, follows hot on the heels of the ambitious Globe to Globe festival. Launching with Dominic Dromgoole’s new production of Henry V, the season will see Rylance – currently performing in Jerusalem in the West End – take on two of Shakespeare’s major characters – the title role in a new production of Richard III and a reprisal of his widely celebrated performance of Olivia in Twelfth Night, 10 years after its original premiere; both of which will be staged as ‘original practices’ productions. The Globe’s main house programme is completed by a new production of The Taming of the Shrew. Artistic Director Dominic Dromgoole commented: “It was the Globe's greatest stroke of good fortune to have Mark as its first Artistic Director – an actor of great distinction, and a leader of rare imagination. No-one has contributed more to the success of the Globe than Mark, and we all – actors, artists and audiences – play happily within the conditions he created. It is our further great good luck that he is returning, with his Original Practices team, to play in the Globe again. It will be a fitting climax to an extraordinary summer which begins with our unprecedented Globe to Globe festival.”
Richard III and Twelfth Night will be directed by Tim Carroll, designed by Jenny Tiramani with music by Claire van Kampen – the creative team behind the original 2002 version of Twelfth Night. Performed in rep by an all male cast – many of whom will be new to these 2012 productions – the original practices approach to staging will employ recreated clothing, music and dance. Twelfth Night and Richard III will be a coproduction between Shakespeare’s Globe, Sonia Friedman Productions and Shakespeare Road.
The play which opened the first and the current Globe, Henry V, will close the Globe to Globe Festival and launch the main 2012 theatre season in June. In continuation of the 2010 productions of Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, Henry V will be directed by Artistic Director Dominic Dromgoole with Jamie Parker in the title role. Much loved for his performance as Prince Hal two years ago, Parker returns to the character, once known for his wild and youthful antics with Falstaff, to chart his journey into a mature man embarking on a successful conquest of France. Completing the in-house 2012 theatre season will be a new production of The Taming of the Shrew, Shakespeare’s most outrageous comedy, directed by Toby Frow.