The theme for this summer’s Shakespeare in the Park might be everything to do about scamming the system.

On opening night of the Public Theater’s production of “Much Ado About Nothing” on May 21, one Upper East Sider scored three prime seats — second-row center — normally reserved for seniors.

He told The Post he paid $125 per ticket plus a 30 percent tip to a representative from a local line-sitting company who said they hire the elderly to stand in the senior citizens line at the Public Theater’s box office in Central Park to obtain the preferred-seating ducats.

“They told me I was getting senior tickets because they get the first 10 rows in the theater,” said the ticket buyer, who is not a senior and did not want to be identified.

The Public Theater, which has been putting on the plays in Central Park since 1962, distributes free tickets to its Shakespeare productions from its box office at the Delacorte Theater in the park and other venues. Long lines to obtain tickets to the same evening’s performances often start forming at 6 a.m.

The line for seniors and disabled people also forms near the Delacorte, where those waiting for tickets can sit on benches in the shade.

Theater-goers can obtain two tickets to a single performance, and are allowed to come back for two more tickets on a different day. Theater employees check identification for those standing in line, but do not check ID on the evening of the performance. So a non-senior buyer who scalps tickets from a senior doesn’t risk much.

“It’s a travesty,” said Rona Green, 78, a retired social worker who was waiting in line for senior tickets on Friday. “Scalping tickets goes against the whole idea of a public theater.”

But Robert Samuel, the founder of Same Ole Line Dudes, said his company doesn’t sell the tickets, but sells the service of waiting in line. And for the Shakespeare tickets, he told The Post he employs line sitters who work the regular line-up, not the senior line.

“We do have one senior, but she doesn’t like to be out that early to stand in line,” Samuel said. “And we always tell people that the tickets are totally random, and we make no guarantees as to the seating.”

Members of the senior line told The Post that they have noticed that the theater company has increased scrutiny lately.

“They’re definitely cracking down,” said David Shani, 67, a professor of international business, who waited in the senior line for tickets. “Before, people would get tickets and then go to the back of the line to start all over again. Now, they’re watching.”

The Public Theater did not return calls seeking comment.

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