... giving us an excuse to dust of some vintage Vedder photographs.
The City Parks Foundation has officially announced the 2012 season of SummerStage, but one thing really stood out amongst the 54-page PDF press release we received: over in the Bronx they'll be doing a re-imagined version of Hamlet set to the music of Pearl Jam. Say what? According to the release, the theatrical concert event, called A King of Infinite Space, will take place on July 13th and 14th in Crotona Park.
"Noted playwright Mando Alvarado’s modern spin on William Shakespeare’s Hamlet places the plot in the Lower East Side for a more relatable take on the quintessential tale of struggling family dynamics, power, and revenge. Fusing the music and themes from American rock icon Pearl Jam’s ground-breaking album, Ten, with a gritty Lower East Side dynamic, this concert event relates Shakespeare’s 17th century literature to 21st century New York City."
We are shocked that they didn't replace "gritty" with "grungy," given neither is accurate. But moving along, the massive aforementioned PDF file declares the musical big draws at this time to be Big Daddy Kane, Dawes, Bobby Womack, a Blue Note Jazz night with DJ ?uestlove, and Inner Circle. There's also mention of the CBGB Festival, which looks like it's been folded into the SummerStage lineup, and will only take place one day, July 7th, starting at 3p.m. (no acts have been announced yet). More additions to the summer series will be announced in the coming weeks.
