Summer Season
The Globe, SE1

Perhaps it shouldn't be surprising that The Globe is the most successful theatre in the country, last year playing to 87 per cent of its 1,500 capacity.

For one, it charges just £5 for more than one-third of its audience — and perhaps more significantly, the scrupulously reconstructed Elizabethan amphitheatre, with its oak, thatch and wattle, is every American tourist's wet dream.

However, while the box office is healthy, it is often overlooked for its artistic achievements — and last night's party for Shakespeare's birthday saw the opening of an ambitious summer season which artistic director Dominic Dromgoole hopes will change that.

Dromgoole's production of King Lear opens the run (until 17 August) starring veteran actor David Calder (last seen in Tom Stoppard Rock 'n' Roll) as Lear and Shameless's Kellie Bright as Regan. Danny Lee Wynter, so impressive in Stephen Poliakoff 's Joe's Palace and Capturing Mary, plays the Fool.

Next comes A Midsummer Night's Dream (in repertory from 10 May to 4 October) starring Siobhan Redmond as Titania/Hippolyta — an inspired piece of casting. Timon of Athens and the Merry Wives of Windsor are also programmed, while two modern works, Chι Walker's The Frontline — which casts a wry eye over London on a Saturday night — and Glyn Maxwell's new French Revolution drama, Liberty, will both aim to exploit the theatre's capacity for large-scale narrative.

The thrilling thing about the Globe is the particular relationship created between audience and actor. Every performance is unique — and given the open-air auditorium, subject to all manner of climatic changes.

Of course, Shakespeare's original audience, made up of 3,000 volatile bodies, was more akin to a football match or rock 'n' roll crowd. People sang, drank, copulated and heckled.

So for five performances from 23 May, Footsbarn Theatre Company celebrates the complete works with its Shakespeare Party, billed as a fantastic and anarchic carnival of theatre, masks, puppetry and circus. We're promised Juliet on a tightrope — and a stand-up-style gravedigger called Dave. The mind boggles.

Information: 020 7401 9919, www.shakespeares-globe.org.