You know how when you learn a new word and then you start seeing it everywhere? That’s how I have been feeling about Shakespeare all spring.
A little more than a year ago, when I was planning my very first tour of Shakespeare’s England, I perhaps somewhat naively said to my traveling companion–who studied at RADA, lives in London, and knows a heck of a lot more about Shakespeare than I do–that, gee, Shakespeare is really trending. She laughed and mentioned, well, it is the 400th anniversary of his death.
Yes, yes, I knew that. But I still couldn’t help be marveled by the new-word phenomenon. One of my mentors is fond of saying “You don’t know what you don’t know,” and basically, I had no idea how pervasive Shakespeare really is in today’s culture. And I dedicate a whole class day to showing video homages and parodies of HAMLET to my high school Seniors! The hackneyed cliche of Shakespeare always having something new to show us continues to ring true.
On a cold and auspicious day in February I met with an old friend in New York and told her about the memoir I’m writing. She asked me if I was a member of the New York Shakespeare Society. There you go, another “new word.” What New York Shakespeare Society? Within 24 hours I was a member, and had signed up to attend every fabulous lecture and event on their spring schedule. At these events I’ve already met so many wonderful, inspiring, like-minded people, and I’ve had my knowledge of Shakespeare and his work augmented considerably. My poor students on the Tuesdays after the Monday talks.
I saw Michael Sexton give a wonderful talk on Shakespeare in New York: Booth and Forrest; Peter Holland on The Children of Beatrice and Benedick: From Much Ado to Philadelphia Story, and Stephen Greenblatt on The Rites of Memory: Ghosts, Revenge, and Conscience in Hamlet. Tonight I’m heading up to attend their annual Gala Benefit at the Players Club on Gramercy Park. I can’t wait to celebrate John Douglas Thompson and the Hunts Point Children’s Shakespeare Ensemble in Edwin Booth’s historic home.
My cursory web research has revealed that there is nary a major American city that doesn’t have at least one Shakespeare theater, and that almost without exception these theater companies either have, or are starting, Shakespeare Education Outreach programs to reach local schools in their area. One such example is The Quintessence Theater Group of Philadelphia whose pilot Education Outreach Program started this spring with a fabulously hilarious production of Love’s Labor’s Lost, and will continue next season with Julius Caesar. The long-established and much respected Philadelphia Shakespeare Theater has turned their focus almost entirely to performance-based education programs, and earlier this month I had the great pleasure of attending the Philadelphia Free Library performance of their 90-minute Hamlet that they toured to middle and high schools for the past year.
So, little more than a year later, I am happy to report: I think I was right! It seems Shakespeare–seems madam? I know not seems. Nay, it is–trending.
There is evidence far and wide that the groundswell of productions, education, and outreach programs–that may have been inspired by the 2016 anniversary–has spawned a tide that will continue to flow for years to come. This program announced by the American Shakespeare Center is just one example:
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/04/21/theater/american-shakespeare-center-to-commission-38-modern-riffs.amp.html
The last time I drove up to New York for one of these events I listened to this wonderful program on Hamlet in prison that a friend sent me:
https://m.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/218/act-v
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