Tony Award Nominee and Directing alum Saheem Ali '07 is directing Twelfth Night for The Public Theatre's beloved summer tradition of Shakespeare in the Park. Twelfth Night will be the debut production in the recently renovated Delacorte Theater in Central Park and will run from August 20 to September 13, 2025.
Twelfth Night is one of Shakespeare's best-loved comedies, following twins Viola and Sebastian as a shipwreck invites convoluted, merry hijinks, weaving fake identities and love triangles. In the wake of the wreck, Viola, who has lost Sebastian, poses as a man and falls in love with Duke Orsino, who is in love with Olivia, who has fallen in love with Viola's false identity. Millennial audiences might remember the latest film adaptation of the play, 2006's She's the Man starring Amanda Bynes.
Ali's friend and fellow Kenyan, Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong'o, will play the lead role of Viola. Ali and Nyong'o played Juliet and Mercutio in a performance of Romeo and Juliet as teenagers, and since collaborated in The Public Theatre's staging of the same play in 2021. Again, Ali directed and Nyong'o played the lead role.
In Twelfth Night, Nyong'o will star alongside Peter Dinklage, Sandra Oh, and Jesse Tyler Ferguson. Nyong'o's brother Junior Nyong'o will play her on-stage twin Sebastian.
Twelfth Night is the first production to take the open-air Delacorte Theater since its temporary closure nearly two years ago. The $85 million redesign was the first significant renovation since the theater's opening in 1962. The theater was transformed from a venue reminiscent of a high school grandstand into a modern, ADA accessible facility seating over 1,800.
"So this renovation, which is so important to us, has made a theatre that is free—because the theatre, itself and everything we make within it, is the property of the people of New York," said The Public's Artistic Director, Oskar Eustis, to Playbill. "You own it, we're just the stewards of it. It is accessible, because it needs to belong to everybody in New York."
Shakespeare in the Park will always be a free production. Twelfth Night tickets are free and available through five distributors, as well as in advance to Public Theater members.
