Jonathan Pryce & Michelle Terry to star at the Globe

The Shakespeare's Globe Theatre on London's South Bank has announced initial casting for its 2015 season, which will be the final season for Artistic Director Dominic Droomgoole.

Olivier and Tony Award winner Jonathan Pryce will star as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, which runs from 23 April to 7 June 2015, with an official opening on 30 April 2015. Mr Pryce will be directed by Jonathan Munby who returns to The Globe after directing 'Antony & Cleopatra' starring Eve Best last Summer.

His many theatre credits include his Tony Award-winning performance in 'Comedians' (West End and Broadway), his Olivier Award-winning portrayal of 'Hamlet,' his Olivier and Tony Award-winning performances in 'Miss Saigon' (West End and Broadway), 'The Caretaker' (West End and Broadway), 'Oliver!' 'My Fair Lady,' 'Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,' 'Glengarry Glen Ross,' and 'King Lear' at the Almeida.

Mr Pryce's screen credits include 'Something Wicked This Way Comes,' 'Brazil,' 'Glengarry Glen Ross,' 'Carrington,' 'Evita,' and 'Tomorrow Never Dies,' and his Emmy-nominated performance in 'Cranford: Return to Cranford.' He will also shortly be appearing as Cardinal Wolsey in the television adaptation of Hilary Mantel's 'Wolf Hall.'

Further casting has been announced for As You Like It, as Olivier Award winner Michelle Terry takes on the role of Rosalind. Blanche McIntyre will direct the comedy, which runs from 15 May to 5 September 2015, with an official opening on 20 May 2015.

Ms Terry last appeared at the Globe as Titania in the 2013 production of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' and also performed in the 2009 production of 'Love's Labour's Lost.' She won an Olivier Award in 2011 for her portrayal of Sylvia in 'Tribes' at the Royal Court. Her many theatre credits include 'Before The Party' (Almeida), 'In the Republic of Happiness' (Royal Court) and 'The Comedy of Errors', 'London Assurance,' 'All's Well That Ends Well' and 'England People Very Nice' at the National Theatre. She also co-wrote and appeared with Ralf Little in the Sky 1 series 'The Café.'

The Summer 2015 season, which is constructed around the theme 'Justice and Mercy', probes the strengths and weaknesses of judicial law and the various tugs-of-war between family, state, religion, love, sex and duty that have defined human morality for centuries.

The season also includes the following productions:

There will be a collaboration between Shakespeare's Globe and the Royal & Derngate theatre, who will present a touring production of King John, which will run at the Globe from 1 to 28 June. Directed by James Dacre, this new production will see a large company of actors and musicians explore a tangled world of ruthless politicking and fatal power struggles. It will also visit the Holy Sepulchre Church (a frequent haunt of King John and his court) in Northampton, and Temple Church, the church of Inner and Middle Temple in London.

Dominic Dromgoole's new production of Measure for Measure will then run at the venue from 20 June to 17 October 2015, with an official opening on 1 July 2015. This will be his final production as Artistic Director of the venue - a role which he enjoyed since 2006.

This will be followed by Richard II, directed by Simon Godwin which runs from 11 July to 18 October 2015, with an official opening on 22 July 2015.

The summer's new writing season will begin with Helen Edmundson's The Heresy of Love, a telling of the life of seventeenth-century Mexican nun and playwright Juana Inés de la Cruz, which premiered at the RSC in 2012. This will run from 31 July to 5 September 2015 with an official opening on 5 August 2015.

Adele Thomas will direct a contemporary distillation of all three plays from Aeschylus's Oresteia which will run from 29 August to 16 October 2015, with a press night on 2 September 2015. Known as one of the great cornerstones of Western drama, the Oresteia dramatises the shift away from the 'natural law' of the individual blood vendetta and towards a self-governing polis founded on principles of fair trial and punishment.

The final Globe production of the season will be Jessica Swale's Nell Gwynn which charts the rise of brilliant wit and charmer Nell Gwynn - from lowly satsuma-seller in the pit, to leading actress on the stage, to King's escort in the Royal Box. This runs from 19 September to 17 October 2015, with an official opening on 24 September 2015.

Two visiting companies will once again bring foreign language productions of Shakespeare's classic to the venue, beginning with the return of The National Theatre of China's Richard III in Mandarin which runs from 20 to 25 July 2015. This is later followed by the Hong Kong's Tang Shu-wing Theatre Studio production of Macbeth in Cantonese which runs from 17 to 23 August 2015.

Further Casting and exact schedules for all productions is yet to be announced.

Tickets for the 2015 season will go on general sale on Monday 9 February 2015.