Big stars and tiny ninjas in RSC's showpiece (From Tewkesbury Admag)

Big stars and tiny ninjas in RSC's showpiece

THE breadth and scale of the Royal Shakespeare Company's Complete Works Festival is revealed in the latest announcement from Stratford.

As well as a host of visiting companies from all over the world and a huge range of associated events, the festival will include big-name stars both onstage and off.

They include the return of the RSC's founder, Sir Peter Hall, who will direct his first UK production of Measure for Measure in September.

The year-long festival, which launches on Shakespeare's birthday, April 23, is the first time that all of Shakespeare's plays and poems have been staged at the same event.

With 23 RSC shows, 17 international productions and 14 by UK-based visiting companies, the RSC is gearing up to host what will be one of the major international cultural events of the year.

Newly announced highlights include Nothing Like The Sun - The Sonnet Project, a new project curated by Gavin Bryars featuring Shakespeare's sonnets set to music by contemporary musicians and Shakespeare on Film, a free series of films shown on an outdoor screen on the banks of the River Avon, curated by film critic and presenter, Mark Kermode

A year-long series of Broadside debates tackling issues raised in Shakespeare's plays will feature speakers including the Archbishop of Canterbury, Fay Weldon and Robert Fisk

A central platform of the festival is the links with visiting companies from around the world.

They include New York-based theatre company Tiny Ninja Theater performing Hamlet for the first time in the UK using an inch-high cast of small, plastic ninja figurines and the Berliner Ensemble, which inspired the creation of the modern RSC, presenting its production (first staged in 2000) of Richard II directed by the company's artistic director, Claus Peymann

RSC artistic director Michael Boyd said: "I hope the legacy of the festival will be a set of partnerships and new relationships that extend well beyond the life of the Complete Works and an outward-looking RSC that is challenged and stimu-lated by theatre from around the world."

Onstage the festival opens in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre with Nancy Meckler's production of Romeo and Juliet. Rupert Evans and Morven Christie make their RSC debuts as the star-crossed lov-ers and Sorcha Cusack returns to the RSC as Juliet's nurse.

In the Swan Theatre, Patrick Stewart and Harriet Walter take on the title roles in Gregory Doran's Antony and Cleopatra.

Other casting highlights announced include Finbar Lynch returning to the RSC after nearly 12 years as Cas-sius in Julius Caesar, Desmond Barrit joining Judi Dench (Mistress Quickly) as Falstaff in Merry Wives The Musi-cal directed by Gregory Doran and with music by Paul Englishby and lyrics by Ranjit Bolt, and William Houston and Janet Suzman mak-ing a return to the RSC to play Coriolanus and Volumnia in Coriolanus.

The final production will be King Lear, di-rected by Trevor Nunn and with Sir Ian McKel-len in the title role in March next year.

Geoffrey Streatfeild, Chuk Iwuji and Jonathan Slinger will play the title roles in Henry V, Henry VI and Richard III respectively, as part of Michael Boyd's two-year project to stage Shakespeare's complete History Cycle, and Dame Judi Dench

Continuing the RSC's commitment to new work, the festival will feature four new commissions inspired by Shakespeare's plays and written by some of the country's leading play-wrights.

A full programme of other events including: talks and demonstrations with actors, directors and RSC practitioners; debates; live music; backstage tours; workshops and family and schools events, will be available to the public in March 2006.

A performance schedule can also be found in the Press section at www.rsc.org.uk.