William Shakespeare's The Tempest will play at Beijing Capital Theater from June 21 to 24 to mark the theatre's 100th anniversary.

"It is Shakespeare's final play, and arguably his finest," said Barrie Rutter, founder and artistic director of the UK-based Northern Broadsides Theatre Company, which is staging the production.

"The play is rich in the very stuff of human drama - young love, brooding revenge, broad humor and touching forgiveness," he said.

The fact that the majority of the Chinese audience may not be able to understand the English play does not worry Rutter.

"Redemption, forgiveness, charity, virtue, faith in the next generation and overall love are the final abiding emotions in the play. They are as contemporary now as they have ever been and easily recognizable by young or old, Chinese or British," he said.

The theatre company is planning to put on Romeo and Juliet at the Beijing Olympics Arts Festival in 2008.

(Xinhua News Agency May 30, 2007)