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Celebrating Shakespeare and the thrill of live theatre this #WorldTheatreDay

  This #WorldTheatreDay we take a look back at some of our favourite productions in our Globe Theatre and Sam Wanamaker Playhouse from the last 25 years

A bright blue evening sky above a circular timber theatre, with pointed thatched roof.

Celebrating #WorldTheatreDay in our wooden ‘O’.

A man wearing a tunic with the English and French emblems, and armour with a helmet adorned by a golden crown.

From our opening performance 25 years ago of Henry V with Mark Rylance in the title role…

A man wearing yellow cross-gartered stockings leers at a man in white painted Elizabethan makeup.

…to our all-male Original Practices production of Twelfth Night with Stephen Fry. Photographers:  John Tramper (L) and Simon Annand (R)

An actor wearing black sits on a box, holding a human skull aloft and addressing it

From 2014-16 we took Hamlet to every single country in the world – book ending this incredible journey with performances in our wooden ‘O’, of course. Photographer:

Actor sitting powerfully in a thrown

In 2003 Kathryn Hunter took on the villainous Richard III in an all-female production. Photographer: Donald Cooper

Actor on stage with a wooden spoon on their mouth

Roger Allam gave an Olivier award-winning turn as the loveable rogue Falstaff in Henry IV Parts 1 & 2 (2010). Photographer: John Haynes

2014 saw our indoor jewel-box candlelit theatre, the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, open its door for the first time, with John Webster’s Jacobean revenge tragedy, The Duchess of Malfi. Photographer: Mark Douet

A fearful looking man stands holding two knives in the dark shadows of an indoor playhouse.

We staged The Scottish Play for the first time indoors in 2018, with Paul Ready as the tormented Macbeth. Photographer: Tristram Kenton

Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II was powerfully portrayed in a new production in 2018. Photographer: Marc Brenner

And Shakespeare’s epic cycle of history plays, Henry VI and Richard III, were tackled by our Globe Ensemble taking on over 60 characters. Photographer: Marc Brenner

Two actors fight on stage with swords

Michelle Terry’s inaugural season as Artistic Director featured Hamlet…

As You Like It production photograph

…and the glorious pastoral comedy, As You Like It…

…followed in 2019 by a roaring production of The Merry Wives of Windsor. Photographers: Tristram Kenton (L, C) and Helen Murray (R)

A man with a large black afro and gold sequinned dress, stands posing on stage.

Le Gateau Chocolat as Feste in former Artistic Director Emma Rice’s 2017 Twelfth Night…

A group of actors wearing dark tracksuits move forwards, their hands raised in the air.

…and former Associate Artistic Director Matthew Dunster renamed and reclaimed Shakespeare’s Cymbeline as Imogen. Photographers: Hugo Glendinning (L) and Tristram Kenton (R)

The cast of 'Emilia' gather on stage with their arms in the air, the yard audience also have their arms in the air

2018 saw us burn the house down with the fiery Emilia by Morgan Lloyd Malcolm. Photographer: Helen Murray

A crowd of standing audience members are covered in a black sheet, whilst an actor wearing red robes and bloody grimaces on stage.

Notorious for their faint counts, Lucy Bailey’s Macbeth (2010)…

An actor stands on a raise platform in the Yard of the Globe Theatre, surrounded by standing audience members. They wear a traditional Roman toga with purple sash, their arm raised in salute into the sky. The open-air of the Globe Theatre is covered by black hanging drapes, trapping the smoke inside.

…and Titus Andronicus (2014) saw our Globe Theatre transformed with black hanging drapes. Photographer: Ellie Kurttz (L) and Simon Kane (R)

A wide photo of an outdoor stage at night with large lilac balloons decorating the top of the stage

Emma Rice’s 2016 A Midsummer Night’s Dream was transformed our wooden ‘O’ into a summer festival. Photographer: Steve Tanner.

FINIS.

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