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March 5, 2010
Undead Bard!
Submitted by Listener, G. Robin Smith:
Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Undead
Chop Bard, starting up again
Episode 21, the first in our Hamlet series, is on it’s way to completion, and will be posted later today.
site updates
Made some slight changes to the site. Interactive Shakespeare is gone for now- but will return in the future with more than just a bouncing head. If you really miss it, you can visit the old page here. Also in the works- complete scripts for all of Shakespeare's plays... well, the ones we're pretty sure he wrote anyway.
Otherwise, I’m deep in preparation for hamlet. It should prove to be quite a challenge, and I’m really looking forward to the new series.
final romeo & juliet show
Our Chop Bard series of Romeo & Juliet comes to an end, with Episode # 20.
Next up- Hamlet, which will be starting near the end of February.
happy holidays
from Love's Labour's Lost, Act V, scene 2
When Isicles hang by the wall, And Dicke the Sphepheard blowes his naile; And Tom beares Logges into the hall, And Milke comes frozen home in paile: When blood is nipt, and waies be fowle, Then nightly sings the staring Owle Tu-whit to-who. A merrie note, While greasie Jone doth keel the pot.
happy birthday queen elizabeth
Elizabeth I was the daughter of King Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn.
She was born on 7 September 1533 at Greenwich Palace. On 17th November 1558, she ascended the throne, and was crowned Queen on Sunday 15th January 1559.
Her reign as Queen of England lasted until 1603. She died at Richmond Palace on the 24th March 1603.
twelfth night
By WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Directed by DANIEL SULLIVAN
Shakespeare in the Park
This summer kicks off with a powerhouse production of one of Shakespeare’s most beloved plays. This beguiling comedy follows the romantic adventures of Viola and her twin Sebastian, both shipwrecked in the enchanted dukedom of Illyria. At the helm of this time-honored story of cross-dressing and mistaken identity, all in the name of love, is Tony Award winning Director Daniel Sullivan.For more information, head over to the Public Theater and check it out.
possible shakespearean
theater found inlondon
By JENNIFER QUINN, Associated Press Writer Wed Aug 6, 4:36 PM ET
LONDON - The theater where "The Merchant of Venice" and "Romeo and Juliet" likely debuted and where William Shakespeare himself may have trodden the boards has likely been discovered in east London, archaeologists at the Museum of London said Wednesday.
The possible foundations of what is known as simply, The Theatre, were unearthed by builders excavating the site — a vacant garage — for another structure. Museum archaeologists were called to the location to make sure nothing was destroyed, and had a eureka moment.
"We were there, scratching our heads, looking into the trenches, thinking, 'this could be it,'" said Jo Lyon, a senior archaeologist at the museum. "So we did some more research, and then we found the angled walls. And we all went, 'Oh my gosh, this should be it.' "
Other theaters of similar vintage also have angled walls, so the discovery was significant. Archaeologists had known for a long time there was a high probability for The Theatre to be on this particular site. But there are no maps that show its location, no images to show what it might have looked like, and only a vague description of it.
"It's in the right place, it's at the right angle to be a polygonal shape," Lyon said. "It's a pretty high possibility."
The possible discovery of The Theatre, built in 1576 and where Shakespeare's troupe performed in the 1590s, could complete the set of open-air theaters where the Bard's plays were staged. The Rose theater's location was discovered in 1989 in Bankside, just south of the River Thames in central London, and the Globe theater is nearby. A replica of the Globe was built on a site close to the original and opened in 1997.
Shakespeare's company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, only moved into The Theatre in the 1590s. Until then, they had been performing at the Rose, but a shake up in the London theater scene necessitated the move, said Martin Wiggins, a fellow at the Shakespeare Institute at the University of Birmingham.
And in 1597, a dispute with the landlord forced the company to move again, Wiggins said. The company didn't own the ground The Theatre was built on, but Lord Chamberlain's Men did own the material it was built with, so they simply dismantled the entire theater and moved it south across the River Thames, where it was rebuilt and renamed the Globe.
But The Theatre's foundations remained in east London, and that's what archaeologists believe they have found.
"The first thing I want to know about it is what the foundations can tell us about the architecture," Wiggins said. "How big was it? How does it compare with the Rose? How does it compare with the Globe? How similar are they?"
Wiggins said an understanding of what the theater looked like could help Shakespearean scholars understand more about this period in the playwright's history.
"The size of the theater will have an impact on the way the play is written," he said.
Other works that would have been performed during the period Shakespeare's company was at The Theatre would have included "Henry IV," "Richard II," "King John," and "the Merry Wives of Windsor," Wiggins said.
Lyon said it's unlikely The Theatre's complete foundations will ever be fully excavated, but her team intends to examine them further. Fittingly, a new theater is being built on the site, ensuring the foundations below are protected.
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