The Winter’s Tale, The Empress & More On Tap for Royal Shakespeare Company

The Royal Shakespeare Company will present The Winter’s Tale, The Empress, Hamlet and more as part of their upcoming 2013 season in Stratford-Upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. As previously announced, the new season marks Michael Boyd’s final year as artistic director.

The company’s winter season features new adaptations of The Orphan of Zhao (October 30 through March 28, 2013), Boris Godunov (November 15 through March 30, 2013), A Life of Galileo (January 31 through March 30, 2013), The Mouse and His Child (November 17 through January 12, 2013), as well as The Merry Wives of Windsor (October 25 through January 13, 2013).

In January 2013 the company will present Shakespeare’s classic play The Winter’s Tale, directed by Lucy Bailey. The production is slated to go on a U.K. tour following the limited engagement at the Royal Shakespeare Company. Dates, venues and casting will be announced shortly.

Following The Winter’s Tale, a single company of actors will perform Shakespeare classics Hamlet (helmed by David Farr and starring Jonathan Slinger), As You Like It (directed by Maria Aberg) and All’s Well That Ends Well (helmed by Nancy Meckler).

Tanika Gupta’s new play The Empress will receive a world premiere at the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Swan Theatre, directed by Emma Rice. The play focuses on Queen Victoria who, although she held the title of Empress of India, never visited her subjects there. They however came to London in droves. The Empress is the story of the Queen’s growing attachment to one of her Indian manservants.

Also at the Swan Theatre, a single company of actors will perform Titus Andronicus (directed by Michael Fentiman), A Mad World My Masters written by Thomas Middleton and directed by Sean Foley, and a yet-to-be-titled new play by playwright-in-residence Mark Ravenhill, written as a response to Voltaire’s Candide and directed by Lyndsey Turner.