Join us for Behind the Scenes - Rehearsing Shakespeare with Bill Alexander on his new adaptation of #TheMerchantofVenice - a rare insight into how a top director works on text and character with Lena Robin playing #Portia + Q & A November 26th at 7pm UK time. For more information see below.
Plus Soliloquy Slam Workshops with actor Ruby Campbell (Royal Court Theatre, Sam Mendes). Bring renewed fire and fun to your favourite Shakespearean speech. Through play, sensory exploration & imagination-expanding exercises, we will take Shakespeare’s best known texts on new journeys to uncover the meaning of the Bard’s famous words to us in this moment. Hone your performance skills or simply delve into Shakespeare’s soliloquies in a judgement-free space safe to experiment in. A series of four one-hour workshops, book for all four or single sessions. Tuesdays 7pm, from December 1.
Twelfth Night Read-a-Long Join members of our company for three 90-minute sessions as we read and discuss Shakespeare's masterpiece. You can listen or read as you wish. Put your feet up with a cuppa, sit back and enjoy the end of the week with what has been described as the Bard's most perfect comedy. Discover the lyrical, emotional and bittersweet melody of the text with us on our Sharing Shakespeare Online Platform helping you to stay creative and connected. Book for all three or single sessions. Fridays 2.30pm, from December 4.
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MORE INFORMATION
Screened as part of our Childing Autumn Sharing Shakespeare online platform, this is essential viewing for directors and actors alike, as well as anyone interested in performing or just getting to know the plays in more depth. Bill has adapted the play for a new six-character version A Merchant of Venice which our company is planning to stage in London next year. The fact that this rehearsal takes place online adds an extra dimension and chance for reflection on how theatre professionals can still work together in unprecedented times.
Bill Alexander - "Good and truthful acting makes an audience glad to be alive, more sure of who they are and deeply grateful for the gift of live theatre. The Lord Chamberlain’s Men (Shakespeare's company) had to close their theatre and cease performing many times due to the plague. If that should happen permanently in our own time, then part of what it means to be human will be lost too.
"Acting is a unique and uniquely brave form of creativity in that it calls on a human being to give themselves completely and honestly to a room full of strangers while producing the alchemical transformation of becoming someone else. The director's job is to protect, guide, challenge and encourage the fullest possible realisation of this transformation, which is not easy but, if successful, brings into being a miraculous encounter unparalleled in any other type of art."
Mary Chater, co-founder of Shakespeare in Italy - “Not since the 1980s when John Barton’s legendary ‘Playing Shakespeare’ sessions enthralled television audiences, have contemporary viewers been offered such rare insight into how an experienced director builds trust with a company, enabling them to explore text and character.”
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Sharing Shakespeare, April 23rd, 2020
Launch of our online digital platform of activities, workshops and tutorials #shareyourshakespeare @RSC
6th International Summer School June 26 - July 4, 2020 in Cagli theatre (PU) Marche
#AMidsummerNightsDream with #EmmaLuciaHands and #AsYouLikeIt with #DameJanetSuzman
Fundraising evening with #SirSimonRussellBeale 'in conversation with' Maureen Beattie, president of #Equity
Thursday October 24th 2019 in Queensgate Gardens, South Kensington, London
5th Shakespeare in Italy Summer School, Florence, July 6 to 19, 2019
Please go to Summer School for more information.
Past Events
‘From Hamlet to Halifax.’
In November 2017, we held a fundraising event with Sir Derek Jacobi in the twelfth century Temple Church in central London. He talked to Tony Arlidge about his life as an actor. The audience had a great evening with champagne and nibbles and Derek supplying plenty of laughs.
We are planning another fundraising event for 2019.