MIL OSI – Source: British Council – New Zealand joins biggest ever global celebration of Shakespeare
NZ will participate in Shakespeare Lives, an unprecedented global programme of events and activities celebrating Shakespeare’s life on the occasion of the 400th anniversary of his death in 2016.
Launched today, the activities will include visits to NZ from a leading practitioner at the Globe Theatre London, working in partnership with the Shakespeare Globe Centre NZ.
Patrick Spottiswoode, Director Globe Education, will attend the National SGCNZ University of Otago Sheilah Winn Shakespeare Festival and other engagements at tertiary institutes and in relation to the Globe to Globe Hamlet Tour.
Acclaimed NZ actor
Shakespeare Lives is an invitation to the world to join in the celebrations by participating in a unique online collaboration and experiencing the work of Shakespeare directly on stage, through film, exhibitions and in schools.
Ciarán Devane, Chief Executive, British Council said: “Power struggles, brutal politics, murder, love, passion, bitter feuds, human weakness and plain farce are universal themes as relevant now as they were when Shakespeare was writing. Shakespeare Lives will engage audiences overseas and in the UK with both the work of the Bard and with the best of contemporary Britain and will open up opportunities for UK institutions, businesses and organisations to work around the world, and for organisations around the world in the UK.”
The programme aims to reach over half a billion people around the world. The British Council and the GREAT Britain campaign are working with host of British theatres, museums, educators and artists on brand new productions of Shakespeare’s plays, film adaptations, public readings and educational resources for schools and English language learners of all ages in the UK and around the world.
Engaging over half a billion people
Launching this autumn, Shakespeare Lives will run throughout 2016, exploring Shakespeare as a living writer who still speaks for all people and nations. Activities across English, education and the arts will explore the story of how a playwright from England came to be shared all over the globe. A major highlight will be All The World’s A Stage, a mass participation project that will invite people from all over the world to upload and share clips of themselves performing lines from Shakespeare plays. It
Rawiri Paratene is the only non-British actor travelling by boat, train, plane and
tall-ship across seven continents from village squares to national theatres, starting and ending at The
Globe theatre over the next two years following what would have been The Bard’s 450th birthday.
This ‘never been done before’ venture opens at The Globe on April 23rd, 2014 (Shakespeare’s 450th
birthday) then will be taken to EVERY country on the planet – 205 in all – over the next two years.
Even countries as small as Samoa and the Solomon Islands can expect performances.
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