Istanbul (Daily Sabah) The program for the 19th Istanbul Theater Festival program was announced at a press conference on Thursday at Rahmi M. Koç Museum.

The 19th Istanbul Theater Festival set to take place from May 9 to June 5 will offer 100 performances by seven foreign and 35 Turkish theater, dance and performance companies across 13 different venues to theater lovers.

To mark Shakespeare's 450th birthday, the festival will host the Propeller Theater Company, a leading world-famous theater group which stages Shakespeare alone. The company will be putting on five performances including "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and "The Comedy of Errors" throughout the festival.

Both plays will be staged by the company's art director Edward Hall, who will be receiving an honorary award at the festival. Plays such as "King Lear" and "Romeo and Juliet" will be staged by local theater groups throughout the festival.

Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV) has been organizing the festival since 2004. In this year's festival, 33 local productions in the program will have their Turkish premiers.

Performances and events will be taking place at different venues throughout the city, such as the Bisahne, Cevahir Stage, DOT, Haldun Taner Stage, ikincikat-karaköy, Kenter Theater, Moda Stage, Harbiye Muhsin Ertuğrul Stage, Sainte Pulcherie French High School, Salon, Şişli Blackout, Üsküdar Studio and Üsküdar Tekel stages.

This rich program will further include Q&A's, performances, film and documentary screenings and workshops that will be attended by famous guests and experts. İKSV Chairman Bülent Eczacıbaşı announced that the Istanbul Theater Festival will continue to contribute to the art and culture of Turkey through workshops and educational programs.

Speaking on behalf of Aygaz, one of the festival sponsors, General Manager Yağız Eyüboğlu said, "This year the festival has an important feature.

2014 marks the 450th anniversary of the birth of, undoubtedly, the most important name in world theater history, Shakespeare. Since 2016 will be the 400th anniversary of his death, the famous playwright will be commemorated with exclusive plays on our stages, as well as around the world.

For the next two years, as Shakespeare had said, "the entire world is a stage." Eyüboğlu further noted that Aygaz was honored to be sponsoring the festival for the past decade.

The Republic of Turkey's Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's Department of Cultural and Social Affairs, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism's State Theaters and the British Council, French Cultural Centre, and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland were among the organizations and corporations that received plaques of gratitude.

The first honorary award of the 19th Istanbul Theater Festival was presented to Prof. Dikmen Gürün, who directed the festival between 1993 and 2013. The second honorary award will be presented to the Polish theater's innovative and young director, Grzegorz Jarzyna, after the TR Warszawa company's performance of the play "No Matter How Hard We Tried" scheduled to be put on stage May 9 at the Harbiye Muhsin Ertuğrul Stage. The third honorary award will be presented to Edward Hall, the art director of the Propeller Theater Company.