BBC launches star-studded Shakespeare Festival
Like the rest of the country in this 400th anniversary year since the death of Shakespeare, thee Beeb has gone mad for the Bard.
Yesterday (Thursday) they have announced their plans for The BBC Shakespeare Festival. It will launch on 23 April – to celebrate Shakespeare's birthday - and continue for a month across our services.
The BBC Shakespeare Festival 2016 is billed as "the most far-reaching celebration of Shakespeare's work ever broadcast". BBC director general Tony Hall said it aimed "to make Shakespeare irresistible to everybody".
Stratford-upon-Avon takes centre stage with the live broadcast on 23rd April, the day of the Birthday Celebrations. As previously announced in the Herald, the RSC have been working with the BBC to develop the programme, which had the working name of The Shakespeare Show. It is now being called Shakepeare Live!
David Tennant will host the broadcast which also include a host of well-known RSC actors, including Dame Judi Dench and Sir Ian McKellen.
Unveiling details of the live broadcast at the launch the BBC's Shakespeare Festival on Thursday, David said: "We have opera, we have ballet, we have hip-hop - all celebrating Shakespeare and what he's done for our cultural heritage."
It will also feature Joseph Fiennes - who played the lead in the film Shakespeare in Love - the English National Opera, Birmingham Royal Ballet, and rapper Akala, founder of the Hip Hop Shakespeare Company.
Meanwhile, the corporation also announced a number of original, star-studded programmes for the spring festival.
Russell T Davies, one of our greatest storytellers, has adapted the original verse of A Midsummer Night's Dream for primetime BBC One with a stellar cast, including Maxine Peake, Matt Lucas, Bernard Cribbins, Elaine Paige and Richard Wilson.
BBC Two is reviving one of the highlights of 2012 with three more episodes of The Hollow Crown, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Judi Dench and many others and executive produced by Sam Mendes, et al.
There are also new productions across television and radio, including a special Horrible Histories on Children’s BBC telling the story of Shakespeare’s early life.
For more details see www.bbc.co.uk
