Three-time Oscar winner Meryl Streep took to the Delacorte stage as Donald Trump June 6, wearing a fat suit, an excess of orange bronzer and with her hair coiffed in signature Trump style. Christine Baranski accompanied the actress as part of the Public Theater’s star-studded gala in Central Park, The United States of Shakespeare.
Continuing with the gender-bending theme of the season—this year’s first Shakespeare in the Park production is an all-female Taming of the Shrew —Streep and Baranski performed “Brush Up Your Shakespeare” from Kiss Me, Kate, a musical number typically sung by two men.
Directed by Jeremy McCarter, the evening featured scenes from Shakespeare’s most celebrated works as well as the poems, songs and stories they inspired, performed by actors of the stage and screen and musicians.
The line-up also featured Phylicia Rashad, Kevin Kline, Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Michael Cerveris, Lisa Kron, Michael John LaChiusa, Jeanine Tesori, Steven Pasquale, F. Murray Abraham, Lily Rabe, Hamish Linklater and many more.