Dench joins Shakespeare company

Judi Dench returns to the Royal Shakespeare Company in December as part of the troupe’s ambitious new season under artistic director Michael Boyd.

Dench, the classical theater actress who in recent years has become a film star, will start performances Dec. 3 in Stratford, England, in “All’s Well That Ends Well,” one of the less frequently seen Shakespeare plays. The 68-year-old actress last acted with the RSC in Stratford in 1979, but since has appeared in several plays for the company in London.

But the core of Boyd’s first fully programmed season since succeeding Adrian Noble last year will be productions in 2004 of four Shakespeare tragedies: “Macbeth,” “Romeo and Juliet,” “Hamlet” and “King Lear.” Corin Redgrave, brother of actresses Lynn and Vanessa Redgrave, will play Lear; Toby Stephens, the son of performers Robert Stephens and Maggie Smith, will play the title role in “Hamlet.”