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Coming Summer 2025.
The Delacorte Theater in Central Park provides hundreds of thousands of visitors access to extraordinary theater—for free. It provides hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers and visitors with the transformative experience of The Public Theater's Free Shakespeare in the Park.
After 62 years as the home of Free Shakespeare in the Park, The Delacorte Theater is due for a major makeover. When the theater reopens in the summer of 2025, it will be more welcoming, more accessible, and more sustainable than ever before.
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The Delacorte project is publicly and privately funded with $42 million contributed by the New York City Mayor, City Council, and Manhattan Borough President, as well as $1 million from New York Assembly Member O’Donnell. The Public also wishes to acknowledge State Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal and NYC Parks who have contributed funding to the Central Park Conservancy’s Delacorte restroom renovation project. The Public is enormously grateful to those who have supported this project, including its generous Board of Trustees and donors.
The Public Theater, in partnership with the Central Park Conservancy, NYC Parks, and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, is proud to lead this historic revitalization. This work will ensure The Delacorte remains part of this great city for future generations.
OCTOBER 2024
Lots of projects are in the works across The Delacorte construction site.
(left) The cinderblock shaft for a new elevator — one of the theater's accessibility additions — has reached full height to the top of the grandstand. The elevator will provide accessible ingress to the stage manager's booth. On the ground, workers are beginning work on a wheelchair lift for both stage and audience access.
(right) The reimagined stage manager's booth is taking shape while work on the grandstand decking continues. A concrete floor has been poured in the top center of the grandstand, and crews have installed steel framing for walls and roof cover. The updated design includes an extended awning—an upgrade from the previous booth—offering better protection against the elements.
(left) Between the Gate 1 entrance and house right of the stage, newly installed poles will support a masking wall. A similar wall is under construction on the house left side. Directly in front of the poles, you can see the concrete foundation of the new wheelchair ramp for grandstand access.
(right) The design of the finished masking wall can be seen in the renovation rendering. Blending into the aesthetic of the revitalized theater, the walls will frame the stage while establishing a boundary between audience and backstage areas.
Photos by Shelly Vance. Rendering provided by Ennead Architects
Built in 1962, the theater has not undergone meaningful capital upgrades since 1999. The plan — a major investment in outdoor cultural space as part of New York’s economic recovery — will dramatically improve the home of Free Shakespeare in the Park.This design comprehensively addresses the theater’s outstanding code and safety needs, makes core improvements to infrastructure and backstage efficiency, and makes meaningful upgrades to support its theatrical program. The design is also contextual and maintains The Delacorte’s current form, footprint, and views within the park while protecting the sanctity of the theater in the park experience.
We are thrilled to work with our longtime partner once again, Ennead Architects. Ennead oversaw the revitalization of the facade and public spaces at our flagship location on Lafayette Street in 2012 and the recent renovation of the Rehearsal Annex. Ennead has led many other marquee cultural revitalization projects in New York, including the Brooklyn Museum entry pavilion and plaza, Jazz at Lincoln Center, Symphony Space, Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall, and the Rose Center for Earth and Space at the American Museum of Natural History. This continued relationship is based on shared commitments to creating spaces that center radical welcome and equity.
The key proposed design includes:
With over six decades of operation, including the recent staging of the widely-acclaimed performances of Merry Wives, Much Ado About Nothing, Public Works' Hercules, Twelfth Night, and Public Works' As You Like It, and more than five million tickets distributed, Free Shakespeare in the Park is one of New York City’s most iconic cultural experiences.
Conceived by founder Joseph Papp as a way to make great theater accessible to all, The Delacorte Theater officially opened in Central Park on June 18, 1962, with The Merchant of Venice, directed by Papp and Gladys Vaughan and featuring George C. Scott as Shylock. The Merchant of Venice was followed that summer by a production of The Tempest, directed by Gerald Freedman and featuring Paul Stevens as Prospero and James Earl Jones as Caliban. The first Delacorte summer season concluded with King Lear, directed by Papp and Vaughan and featuring Frank Silvera as Lear. Since then more than 150 productions have been presented for free at The Delacorte Theater in Central Park.