In most years, the Public Theater's Mobile Unit takes stripped-down productions of Shakespeare plays on a tour of correctional facilities, shelters and community centers. This summer, however, it is expanding its mandate with a pop-up variety show that it is performing for free in public spaces throughout the five boroughs. The production has three components. First, the National Black Theatre’s Stage for Healing and Resilience, in which artists from the Mobile Unit's community partners are invited to share poems, monologues and songs. Then, writer-actor Malik Work offers excerpts from his autobiographical spoken-word play Verses @ Work, a journey through life on the Lower East Side at the turn of the 21st century. Finally, Work joins Sofia Jean Gomez, Teresa Avia Lim and Reza Salazar to perform conceiver-director Patricia McGregor's Shakespeare: Call and Response, an interactive and semi-improvisational hour-long riff on Shakespearean characters and texts. A full schedule of locations is below; all shows are at 4:30pm except the one on August 8, which is at 2pm.
Schedule for Mobile Unit's Summer of Joy:
July 31–August 1: Astor Place (Manhattan)
August 5–6: Roberto Clemente Plaza (Bronx)
August 7–8: Johnny Hartman Plaza (Manhattan)
August 12: Osborn Plaza (Brooklyn)
August 13: Albee Square (Brooklyn)
August 14–15: 125th Street Plaza (Manhattan)
August 20: Albee Square (Brooklyn)
August 21–22: Myrtle/Wyckoff Plaza (Queens)
August 28–29: Osborn Plaza (Brooklyn)
