THE York International Shakespeare Festival will run from May 15 to 21, perfect timing as it happens for the Reduced Shakespeare Company to present William Shakespeare's Long Lost First Play (Abridged) at the Grand Opera House on May 20.

Written and directed by Reed Martin and Austin Tichenor and performed by Joseph Maudsley, Matthew Pearson and James Percy, the show is on its debut British tour after its world premiere season at the Edinburgh Festival last summer and a run at the renowned Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC.

"Long Lost First Play" is a "barnstormingly irreverent and breathtakingly humorous celebration of our cultural heritage as seen through the eyes of three Americans wearing trainers".

"In a better-late-than-never nod to the Bard’s 400th anniversary, the bad boys of abridgement present this ‘new’ play by the man himself, as discovered in a Leicester car park," say writers Martin and Tichenor.

Since their pass-the-hat origins in 1981, the Reduced Shakespeare Company have created ten stage shows, two television specials, several failed television pilots and numerous radio pieces.

The company’s itinerary has taken in stops in the West End, off-Broadway, at the White House, the Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, Seattle Repertory Theatre and Montreal’s Just For Laughs Festival, as well as performances in Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Japan, Malta, Singapore and Bermuda, plus countless civic and university venues throughout Britain, Europe and the United States.

Tickets for their 7.30pm show on May 20 are on sale at £22 upwards on 0844 871 3024 or at atgtickets.com/york