NewsKevin Kline Will Return to Pirates of Penzance for One-Night-Only Public Theater GalaTony and Academy Award winner Kevin Kline will reprise his performance as the Pirate King in the Public Theater's one-night-only gala concert of the acclaimed 1980 production of The Pirates of Penzance on June 10 at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park.
By
Adam Hetrick
April 25, 2013
Kevin Kline
Photo by Monica Simoes
The 1980 production of the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta was adapted by William Elliot and choreographed by Graciela Daniele. It was first staged at the Delacorte by Wilford Leach in August 1980 prior to transferring to a Tony Award-winning Broadway run in December.
The original cast featured Kline (Cyrano, On the Twentieth Century, "A Fish Called Wanda") as the Pirate King, Linda Ronstadt as Mabel, Rex Smith as Frederic and George Rose as Major-General Stanley.
Additional casting for the gala performance has not been announced. Last summer, Kline co-starred with Meryl Streep in a gala reading of Romeo and Juliet at the Delacorte.
The evening will also pay tribute to late Academy Award-winning writer Nora Ephron ("When Harry Met Sally," "Sleepless in Seattle"), who died June 26, 2012. Ephron's new play Lucky Guy opened on Broadway April 1.
Sir Howard Stringer, Arielle Tepper Madover and Renée Beaumont will serve as gala co-chairs for the event. As previously reported, the Public's Shakespeare in the Park season features The Comedy of Errors, starring Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Hamish Linklater (May 28-June 30); and the new musical adaptation of Love's Labour's Lost, directed and written by Alex Timbers with songs by Michael Friedman (July 23-Aug. 18).
PHOTO SPECIAL: 50 Years of Shakespeare in the Park at the Delacorte
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See Historic Pics of Pacino, Streep, Kline, Portman, Freeman, Walken, Sheen and More in 50+ Years of Shakespeare in the Park!
See Historic Pics of Pacino, Streep, Kline, Portman, Freeman, Walken, Sheen and More in 50+ Years of Shakespeare in the Park!
James Earl Jones, Al Pacino, Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, Natalie Portman, Morgan Freeman and Raul Julia are just a few of the stars to grace the stage of the Delacorte Theater since 1962. As the Public Theater celebrates its 53nd year at the Delacorte, we look back at the last half century of Shakespeare in the Park.
68 PHOTOS
George C. Scott in The Merchant of Venice, 1962
James Earl Jones in The Merchant of Venice, 1962
Richard Jordan and Kathleen Widdoes in The Tempest, 1962
Frank Silvera in King Lear, 1962
Colleen Dewhurst and Michael Higgins in Antony and Cleopatra, 1963
