The Historical Context of Performance

Week 6 - Your Production Research your own Shakespeare play: Hamlet, Richard III, Macbeth, Measure for Measure. What is the play about? When was it first performed? Find a contemporary production of the play you can get an idea of and research it in terms of concept, style, design, casting. Give some attention to your own character and their role in the play. Measure for Measure was written between 1603 and 1604 is seen as one of Shakespeare’s problem plays due to its shift in mood.  Measure for Measure was performed by Shakespeare's company at the Court of James I on December 26, 1604. The piece takes place in Vienna which is filled with brothels and the city's population lacks morality, but despite this the Duke isn't willing to use his authority to fix the city and instead chooses to leave, dressed as a Friar, leaving Angelo in charge who begins to make his own changes.  The play was first published in 1623 in the First Folio. Contemporary  ...

Week 5 - Shakespeare Today Analyse contemporary Shakespeare productions with reference to live performances you may have seen or clips or footage available online. You should comment on what you notice about them and how they differ from what you know about the original performance conditions of Shakespeare’s work? (Don’t be afraid to point out the obviou s). King Lear/Directed by Michael Attenborough/Almeida Theatre https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6LlHID4gD8 This clip clearly highlights the evident difference in lighting as the stage is purposefully lit in certain areas to help intensify the atmosphere and make the actor more visible to the audience. This of course would have been previously impossible in the original performance conditions. The set also looks far more realistic and authentic than it would have done in the original performance. This further enhances the atmosphere and the audience's immersion in the piece. The most notable difference i...

What were the theatres or ‘playhouses’ of Shakespeare’s time like and how were plays staged in them?  Playhouses Before the first public playhouses were built in London in the late 16th century, players performed in the yards and upper rooms of the capital's many inns. By the early 1600s there were several playhouses just outside the City of London. The two main types were: Open-air amphitheatres. These were usually polygonal. The stage projected into the central yard and may or may not have been covered. The audience stood around the stage in the yard, where places were cheapest, or stood or sat in the tiers of galleries that enclosed it. These playhouses relied on natural light. Indoor halls. These were rectangular, with the stage along one of the short sides. The audience sat, either immediately in front of the stage where the seats were most expensive, or in galleries which ran around the other three sides of the room. These playhouses were lit by candles and torche...

What was London like in Elizabethan times and who were the people attending the theater? Audience Members Most of the poorer audience members, referred to as groundlings, would pay one penny (which was almost an entire day's wage) to stand in front of the stage, while the richer patrons would sit in the covered galleries, paying as much as half a crown each for their seats. In 1599, Thomas Platter, a Swiss doctor visiting London from Basel, reported the cost of admission in his diary: "There are separate galleries and there one stands more comfortably and moreover can sit, but one pays more for it. Thus anyone who remains on the level standing pays only one English penny: but if he wants to sit, he is let in at a farther door, and there he gives another penny. If he desires to sit on a cushion in the most comfortable place of all, where he not only sees everything well, but can also be seen then he gives yet another English penny at another door. And in the pauses of the...

Shakespeare's Life & Biography Origins & Final Days William Shakespeare was born in 1564 in a timber-framed house on Henley Street, Stratford-upon-Avon. His father, John Shakespeare, a glove maker and wool dealer, and his mother, Mary Arden, daughter of a farmer from Wilmcote. William attended Stratford Grammar School from the age of 7 until he was 14. The grammar school was held on the upper floor of the old Guildhall, and here the classes were held in Latin, concentrating on grammar and the ancient classics of Greece and Rome. When he turned 18, Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, daughter of a yeoman farmer from Shottery, close to Stratford. The marriage may have been forced, as Anne was already 3 months pregnant with a daughter, Susanna. This first child was followed by twins Hamnet and Judith in 1585. The next 7 years of Shakespeare's life are unknown, though he is rumoured to have worked as a school teacher. Sometime before 1592 Shakespeare left his home a...