Outdoor Shakespeare is back in CT. Here’s a guide to all the bard’s comedies and tragedies taking the stage this summer.

It’s time to luxuriate in verse, ruffled shirts and the occasional swordfight. Shakespeare’s back, and you don’t even have to go inside to see him.

William Shakespeare himself worked in an open-air theater, and countless theater companies have followed his lead, staging the bard’s immortal plays in city parks or on the lawns outside their own indoor theaters. Modern audiences are content to sit on blankets or lawn chairs and aren’t anywhere near as unruly as the “groundlings” of Shakespeare’s time who crowded the front of the stage like the Elizabethan equivalent of a punk rock mosh pit.

Outdoor Shakespeare has been a staple of summer theatergoing in Connecticut for decades. From the 1950s into the 1990s, the place to beat was the American Shakespeare Festival in Stratford, founded by John Houseman with casts that might include the likes of Katharine Hepburn or Christopher Plummer. The theater succumbed to financial difficulties over 30 years ago. There have been many attempts to revive the festival, but now it would also have to be completely rebuilt, as the building (a facsimile of the Globe Theatre of Shakespeare’s London) was destroyed by arsonists in 2019.

While Stratford’s fortunes were waning, an outdoor Shakespeare movement took hold in the 1980s and ‘90s, fueled by arts grants and a demand for summer cultural activities. Several of the Shakespeare companies that exist in Connecticut today, including Capital Classics’ Greater Hartford Shakespeare Festival and New Haven’s Elm Shakespeare Company, started back then.

Here’s a guide to outdoor Shakespeare shows (and one non-Shakespeare one) in Connecticut this summer.

Flock Theatre: ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ and ‘Henry IV Part 2’

New London’s Flock Theatre knows how long summer can be and does two Shakespeare productions in multiple locations. This year Flock Theatre, which is known for inventive stagings and the use of pageantry and puppetry, has already performed “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” in Westerly, Rhode Island. The show shifts to the arboretum at Connecticut College in New London on July 12, 13 and 20-23. Within that same period, the company also plays Mystic Seaport on July 14 and the town green in Hampton on July 15. Just a week after “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” ends its run, Flock Theatre presents the rousing coming-of-age history play “Henry IV Part 2” in a single location, the Connecticut College Arboretum, from July 27-30 and Aug. 3-6. The shows in Mystic and Hampton are free, the others cost $25, $20 for students, seniors and active military or $100 for families of four or more. flocktheatre.org.

Curtain Call: ‘The Tempest’

Curtain Call Inc. has a complex of indoor theater spaces and studios at Sterling Farms, 1349 Newfield Ave. in Stamford. For its summer Shakespeares, the company will work outdoors July 13-16 and 20-23 at 7:30 p.m., performing the eerie island fantasy “The Tempest.” The park opens at 6 p.m. for seating. Free, but you can reserve special seats for $25. curtaincallinc.com.

Valley Shakespeare Festival: ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’

Sometimes Shakespeare festivals take a break from Shakespeare. Moving several centuries forward from the era of the playwright it is named for, the Valley Shakespeare Festival is doing Oscar Wilde’s riotous Victorian comedy “The Importance of Being Earnest,” which has a lot of elements in common with some of Shakespeare’s plays, including mistaken identities, reunited family members, overbearing parents and multiple marriages. “The Importance of Being Earnest” plays in two locations: July 13-16 in Veterans Memorial Park, 38 Canal St. East in Shelton and July 20-23 at Quarry Walk, 300 Oxford Road in Oxford. Free, $10 suggested donation. vsfestival.org.

Greater Hartford Shakespeare Festival: ‘Macbeth’

The Hartford-based Capital Classics company runs one of the oldest outdoor Shakespeare festivals in the state. Performances are July 13-30 on the lawn outside the University of Saint Joseph in West Hartford on Thursdays through Saturdays at 7:30 p.m. and Sundays at 5:30 p.m. There are opening acts before the play happens from choral groups to lectures. $20, $14 student/senior, group discounts available. elmshakespeare.org.

Evergreen Family Theatre: ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’

The Fool in the Forest festival this year offers the forest fantasy “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” staged as if “five plumbers try to put up Shakespeare’s classic tale of nearly 20 characters in 60 minutes.” If you know the play-within-the-play, it kind of makes sense. There are three locations: Aug. 4 and 5 in Henry Park in Vernon, Aug. 8 and 9 at Enfield United Church in Enfield and Aug. 11 and 12 at Riverfront Recapture’s Mortensen Riverfront Plaza, 300 Columbus Blvd., Hartford. All the shows are at 7:30 p.m. Free. evergreenfamilytheatre.org.

Shakesperience Productions: ‘Wanda Loves William’

Shakesperience’s next “Shakespeare in the Litchfield Hills” show, “Romeo & Juliet,” won’t be until August of next year, but the company is holding a special fundraiser for it this summer, a musical revue called “Wanda Loves William.” The Wanda in the title refers to Wanda Houston and her HBH Band, a jazz act with R&B/Soul proclivities. The William, no doubt, means Shakespeare. The benefit is Aug. 5 at River Walk Pavilion in Washington Depot. $50-$500, $25 children. shakesperience.org.

Elm Shakespeare Company: ‘Merry Wives of Windsor’

The largest outdoor Shakespeare event in the state — based on the scale of the production, the number of performances, the size of the audiences (numbering in the tens of thousands each summer) and just about any other measure you want to apply — is Elm Shakespeare Company, which runs for several weeks in Edgerton Park on the New Haven/Hamden line. This year, the Elm Shakespeare Company has chosen one of the lesser-seen comedies, “Merry Wives of Windsor.” It’s directed by an accomplished Shakespeare director, Dawn Monique Williams, who’s worked at Shakespeare & Company in Massachusetts, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and elsewhere. Nightly except Mondays, Aug. 17 through Sept. 3 on the new portable stage that the company introduced last year. Edgerton Park is at 70 Cliff St., New Haven. Free, donations welcome. elmshakespeare.org.