The Cornelia Street Café celebrates William Shakespeare’s birth each year by bringing to the stage actors to read a selection of the bard's sonnets. Robin Hirsch was the master of ceremonies, Paul Hecht directed, and the readers included André De Shields, Barbara Feldon, Kate Forbes and Hecht, himself. In the spirit of Elizabethan times, Hank Heijink played the lute. The performers covered favorites, such as sonnet number 18 (“shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”), as well as some lesser-known lines.