NEW YORK — Acting in one of Shakespeare’s plays is difficult enough without having to dodge a 3,600-pound SUV.
That’s just one of the challenges facing the cast performing “Richard III” this summer in a working outdoor municipal parking lot at the corner of Ludlow and Broome streets in Manhattan’s Lower East Side.
There also are joggers, bikers and dog walkers, lost tourists and the drug-addled. There are sirens, bugs and car alarms, and the smells from a nearby French-Cuban restaurant. And, of course, cars zipping in and out.
“This is not easy. If it was, nobody would come and watch,” says Hamilton Clancy, the producing artistic director of The Drilling Company, which for years has staged the downtown shows.
“The beauty of the parking lot is that people come and go, stay for five minutes or an hour, and they all get an introduction to the Bard that they wouldn’t ordinarily.”
The tradition dates back 17 years and relies on word-of-mouth to attract an audience. All performances are free.
