In 2014, on 23rd April to be precise, the 450th anniversary of Shakespeare's birth will be marked by the start of an unique and ambitious two year World Tour. The "Globe to Globe Hamlet", directed by the Globe's Artistic Director Dominic Dromgoole, will be a completely unprecedented theatrical adventure during which it will visit all 205 nations of the world.
Travelling by pretty well every sort of transport imaginable and performing everywhere from beaches to palaces, the production will share the celebrations with the whole world.
Of the tour, Dominic Dromgoole said: "In 1608, only five years after it was written, Hamlet was performed on a boat – the Red Dragon – off the coast of Yemen. Just ten years later it was being toured extensively all over Northern Europe. The spirit of touring, and of communicating stories to fresh ears, was always central to Shakespeare’s work. We couldn't be happier to be extending that mission even further. By train, coach, plane and boat we aim to take this wonderful, iconic, multifarious play to as many fresh ears as we possibly can."
The small-scale production, which toured the UK, Europe and the United States in 2011 and 2012, is a fresh version of Shakespeare’s classic tragedy of deferred revenge that emphasizes the play’s gallows humour and celebrates the exuberance and invention of its language. A new cast of just eight actors will perform over two dozen parts on a stripped-down booth stage in a brisk two hours and forty minutes.