Shakespeare Theatre Company will continue its online program Shakespeare Hour LIVE! in September with episodes devoted to Shakespeare and the Law (September 9), Shakespeare & Film (September 16), Shakespeare’s Heroines (September 23), and Richard II (September 30).
Each Wednesday at 7:30 p.m., Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Artistic Director Simon Godwin and Resident Dramaturg Drew Lichtenberg lead an online tour through every corner of the Shakespeare universe. Special guests—acclaimed actors, visionary directors, and esteemed scholars—are announced weekly. The sessions are free for STC members, season subscribers, and package holders, and only $10 per session for non-members.
Shakespeare Hour LIVE! is one of the elements of Shakespeare Everywhere, a platform launched this summer for engaging with audiences through digital offerings and innovative new content. While the theaters remain closed, STC’s staff have been busy reimagining STC as a virtual theater organization. Shakespeare Everywhere allows STC to share the inspiration of the classics in homes throughout the District and across the globe.
Catch up on previous episodes here or on Shakespeare Theatre Company’s YouTube channel.
For more information and to register, visit Shakespeare Hour LIVE! or call the Box Office at 202.547.1122 to RSVP.
Shakespeare & The Law
Wednesday, September 9, 7:30 pm
In this special partnership with STC’s Bard Association, join some of the sharpest legal minds of the Washington legal community (including some recent stars of STC’s ever-popular Virtual Mock Trial) as they discuss Shakespeare’s own theatrical connection to the Inns of Court and the outlines of his legal imagination.
Guests: Kate Burton (multiple Tony and Emmy Award nominee; Broadway: Present Laughter, Hedda Gabler; Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal); Jessie K. Liu (Former United States Attorney for the District of Columbia); and Abbe Lowell (Winston & Strawn, LLP; Chair, STC Bard Association)
Shakespeare & Film
Wednesday, September 16, 7:30 pm
From the landmark films of Akira Kurosawa (Throne of Blood, Ran), Orson Welles (Othello, Chimes at Midnight) and Sir Laurence Olivier (Hamlet, Henry V) to more recent adaptations by Kenneth Branagh (Much Ado, As You Like It, Henry V), Baz Luhrmann (Romeo + Juliet), Gus Van Sant (My Own Private Idaho), and Julie Taymor (Titus, The Tempest, A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Shakespeare’s plays have proven to be a fertile source of cinematic imaginings. Join Julie Taymor and more guests for an in-depth discussion of the process of translating Shakespeare’s language to the most visual of mediums.
Guests: Dr. Peter Holland (McMeel Family Chair in Shakespeare Studies, University of Notre Dame; former Director of the Shakespeare Institute at Stratford-upon-Avon) and Julie Taymor (Tony Award-winning director, The Lion King; Will Award honoree)
Shakespeare’s Heroines
Wednesday, September 23, 7:30 pm
Continuing our examination of Shakespeare’s relationship to humor begun with our recent episode on Shakespeare & Clowns, we will examine the female protagonists in his plays, and the respective importance of verbal wit, theatrical imagination, and humane intelligence to be found in his work.
Guests: Helen Hunt (Oscar and Emmy Award winner, As Good As It Gets, Mad About You, Lincoln Center’s Twelfth Night) and Madeline Sayet (Where We Belong, National Directing Fellow, Forbes 30 Under 30 in Hollywood & Entertainment)
Richard II
Wednesday, September 30, 7:30 pm
In anticipation of the upcoming November election, sure to be one of the most controversial and politically charged of many Americans’ lifetimes, the Shakespeare Hour LIVE! team tackles the most controversial and politically charged of Shakespeare’s plays during his lifetime. Staged by the Earl of Essex as part of an attempted revolutionary coup, the controversial deposition scene was published only in its full form after Shakespeare’s death. Richard II is his ultimate study of deposition and succession, of the soft-seeming mechanisms through which the state’s hard and violent powers have often changed hands.
Updated May 16, 2020: Shakespeare Theatre Company extends ‘Shakespeare Hour LIVE’
Shakespeare Theatre Company has announced expansion of its Shakespeare Everywhere programming with new dates through June 10 for Shakespeare Hour LIVE, an ongoing online tour through every corner of the Shakespeare universe. Each Wednesday at 7:30 pm, Artistic Director Simon Godwin and Resident Dramaturg Drew Lichtenberg examine the world of Shakespeare and our own by discussing two plays from the Shakespearean canon that speak to each other thematically, dramaturgically, and historically. Special guests and friends of the STC extended family will also drop by.
These live conversations will take place online on Zoom and require the viewer to have access to the Internet. Access links will be shared with ticket holders in their order confirmation email.
In Shakespeare’s lifetime, the theaters were closed periodically due to plague outbreaks. The first three of the next four sessions discuss plays written during or just after a few of these closures, which correspond closely to leaps in Shakespeare’s craft and a series of masterpieces.
Week 5, May 20: Virtue & Vice. Plays: Henry IV, Part 1 and Henry IV, Part 2
How does Shakespeare dramatize the conflict between good and evil in the battle for the soul of Prince Hal, the future Henry V…and why do the virtuous characters seem so much less fun than the vice-field ones?
Guests: Actor/Producer/Director Sam Waterston will join Kelley Curran (The Oresteia, Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2) and Stephen Greenblatt (Pulitzer Prize–winning author, Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University, and General Editor of The Norton Anthology of English Literature and The Norton Shakespeare)
Week 6, May 27: Identity & Ambiguity. Plays: Twelfth Night and As You Like It
How does Shakespeare explore the mysteries of gender identity and sexuality in these two plays?
Guest: Michael Urie (Hamlet, Buyer & Cellar)
Week 7, June 3: Democracy & Empire. Plays: Julius Caesar and Antony & Cleopatra
How does Shakespeare examine the problems of, respectively, the experiment of self-rule by the people and the extension of one country or people’s sovereignty over others?
Guest: James Shapiro (Professor of English at Columbia University, award-winning Shakespearean author, Shakespeare Scholar-in-Residence at The Public Theater)
Week 8, June 10: Marriage & Mistrust. Plays: Othello and Much Ado About Nothing
How does Shakespeare dramatize the tensions between married (or soon to be married) couples in these two plays?
Guests: TBD
These sessions are free for STC members, season subscribers, and package holders, and only $10 per session for non-members. For more information or to RSVP, visit Shakespeare Hour LIVE or call the box office at 202-547-1122 between noon and 6 PM Monday–Friday.
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The Shakespeare Hour was originally reported April 16, 2020, in Shakespeare Theatre Company announces new digital programming
Shakespeare Theatre Company recently announced the creation of Shakespeare Everywhere, a new platform for engaging with audiences through digital offerings and innovative new content. While theaters remain closed, STC’s staff have been busy reimagining STC as a virtual organization. This initiative will include Online Classes, the #ShakespeareChallenge, and a streaming version of Simon Godwin’s acclaimed production of Twelfth Night—and STC hopes this will allow them to share the inspiration of the classics in homes throughout the District and across the globe.
A significant part of this initiative is The Shakespeare Hour, a month-long online tour through every corner of the Shakespeare universe. Each Wednesday at 7:30 PM, Artistic Director Simon Godwin and Resident Dramaturg Drew Lichtenberg will examine Shakespeare’s world (and our own) by discussing two plays from the canon that speak to each other thematically, dramaturgically, and historically. Special guests and friends of the STC extended family will also drop by.
“All the internet has become a stage. Shakespeare is the electricity fueling our work. Now we have new portals to share his energizing and uplifting vision,” Godwin explains about the decision to move programming online. “Shakespeare himself suffered isolation and closures due to disease. As we live cloistered in our own imaginations, his wisdom can help us through. As Hamlet says, ‘There is infinite space in a nutshell.’ The Shakespeare Hour is one such nutshell. In weekly broadcasts, audiences can travel the classical universe and discover cosmic spaces. Shakespeare looks in both directions—inside our hearts and out—into new worlds. Now is the perfect moment to embark on a soul-expanding journey into what makes Shakespeare more illuminating and inspiring than ever.”
The series will begin on April 22 with “Romance & Magic,” a discussion about Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream with special guest Finn Wittrock, who was last seen at STC in 2008, playing Romeo in an all-male production of Romeo and Juliet. Known for his performances in Ryan Murphy’s FX series American Horror Story, Wittrock also played Demetrius in a 2017 film adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, directed by Casey Wilder Mott.
In this inaugural session, the hosts will discuss Shakespeare’s two early masterpieces and why they remain such popular and beloved works, how Shakespeare helps change our understanding of tragedy and comedy, teenage identity, and the magical experience of nature. The discussion will consider what makes these works different from what came before, and Simon’s thoughts on directing Romeo and Juliet for the National Theatre.
The Shakespeare Hour
Wednesday nights at 7:30 PM, starting April 22 – May 13, 2020. Live on Fuzw. Free for STC members, season subscribers, and package holders; $10 for non-members
In Shakespeare’s lifetime, the theaters were closed periodically due to plague outbreaks. Our first three sessions discuss plays written during or just after a few of these closures, which correspond closely to leaps in Shakespeare’s craft, as well as a series of masterpieces.
Week 1, April 22: Romance & Magic. Plays: Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Drew and Simon discuss Shakespeare’s two early masterpieces and why they remain such popular and beloved works. As a new member of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, Shakespeare helps change our understanding of tragedy and comedy, teenage identity, and the magical experience of nature. Also discussed: Shakespeare’s “lyric” period, what makes these works different from what came before, Simon’s thoughts on directing Romeo and Juliet at the National Theatre. Guest: Finn Wittrock
Week 2, April 29: Ghosts & the Law. Plays: Hamlet and Measure for Measure
In 1596, Shakespeare’s son Hamlet dies from the plague. A few years later, his father dies. In 1603, James Stuart becomes King James I of England. We discuss Hamlet, Shakespeare’s “poem unlimited” and an endlessly fascinating study of grief and spirituality, with its twin in Measure for Measure, a problem comedy that explores the ambiguities and mysteries of authoritarian leadership, the human being’s relationship to the law, and the law’s relationship to all of us. Guests: Jonathan Cake and Yael Farber
Week 3, May 6: Age & Ambition. Plays: King Lear and Macbeth
As a well-decorated member of the King’s Men and a landowner in his native Stratford-upon-Avon, Shakespeare is settling into a lucrative and decorated middle age. What possesses him to write, in the “Year of Lear,” such plays as King Lear and Macbeth, which rank among the greatest of achievements in world drama? And what do these plays tell us about today? Guests: Helen Carey and Stacy Keach
Week 4, May 13: Hope & Rebirth. Plays: The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest
We end with two plays from the end of Shakespeare’s career, which introduce us to a new genre: the Shakespearean Romance. These two plays have almost opposite dramaturgies—The Winter’s Tale traversing wide gaps in space and time while The Tempest has an almost Aristotelian economy. But they share a deep kinship as pictures of Shakespeare’s thinking at his most personal, lyric, and magical, in some ways returning to the inspiration of his earlier “magic” and “romantic” plays while in others reflecting over every aspect of his life and career. Guests: Peter Marks and Patrick Page
These sessions are free for STC members, season subscribers, and package holders, and only $10 per session for non-members. For more information or to RSVP, visit The Shakespeare Hour or call the box office at 202-547-1122 between noon and 6 PM Monday–Friday.
Shakespeare Theatre Company is the nation’s premier classical theater company. For 33 years, STC has become synonymous with artistic excellence and making classical theater more accessible to audiences in and around the nation’s capital.
Tax-deductible contributions can be made at the Shakespeare Theatre Company website.
