Folger Shakespeare Library: Shakespeare Unlimited

In 1956, Duke Ellington gave a series of concerts at Ontario, Canada’s Stratford Festival. Afterward, festival staff asked the legendary composer—at that point, one of jazz’s elder statesmen—if he’d consider writing a piece about Shakespeare. A year later, Duke Ellington premiered and recorded Such Sweet Thunder, a suite of twelve tunes inspired by the Bard and his characters. We talked with University of New Hampshire Professor of English Douglas Lanier about the suite, the second chapter of Ellington’s career, and how they reflect shifting cultural perceptions of jazz. Lanier, who is also a musician, has written widely about Shakespeare and modern popular culture (in fact, that’s the name of his 2002 book: Shakespeare and Modern Popular Culture), and is an expert on pop adaptations of Shakespeare’s works. He wrote about Ellington’s Such Sweet Thunder for our 2007 exhibition, Shakespeare in American Life. Lanier is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev.   From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published January 8, 2019. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This episode, “I Never Heard So Musical A Discord,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Jennifer Swiatek and Phil Richards at KCRW public radio in Santa Monica, California. Actors Morgan Duncan and Craig Wallace recreate the minstrel performance in this episode. They were originally recorded for the Shakespeare In American Life public radio documentary.

Imagine getting the chance to interview Jude Law, Maxine Peake, Adrian Lester, David Tennant, Simon Russell Beale, and Nicholas Hytner about Shakespeare’s Hamlet. What would you ask? Would you want to hear about backstage hijinks? About Hamlet’s motivations? About what they would change about their performances?   Biographer and theatre historian Jonathan Croall interviewed those Shakespeareans and more for his new book, Performing Hamlet: Actors in the Modern Age. In it, Croall looks at 43 of the highest-profile Hamlet productions in England over the last 50 years, exploring how Laurence Olivier, Alec Guinness, Michael Redgrave, Jonathan Slinger, Richard Burton, and many others have portrayed one of Shakespeare’s most memorable and mercurial characters. Croall came into the studio recently to tell us what he’s learned. He is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published December 11, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “What A Piece Of Work,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at VoiceTrax West in Studio City, California and Gareth Wood at The Sound Company in London.

Georgianna Ziegler, curator, and Allen Packwood, curatorial advisor and director of the Churchill Archives Centre, talk with “Washington Post” journalist Robert Costa about Shakespeare, Churchill, and their extraordinary influence on the English language, as part of the opening of the “Churchill’s Shakespeare” exhibition at the Folger.

Do you remember what sparked your interest in Shakespeare? Was it a great performance, a magic moment in a high school English class, or a clever adaptation? When did you realize you were hooked? Across today’s pop culture landscape, there are more ways than ever to introduce young people to Shakespeare. Pop culture representations of Shakespeare’s plays aren’t just fun: they can help kids—and adults—to take ownership of Shakespeare’s language, critically examine his plots, and connect to his themes. And from West Side Story to The Simpsons, there’s no shortage of options. So we called up our friend Stefanie Jochman to give us a run-down on some of her favorite bits of pop Shakespeare. As a high school English teacher, Jochman is about as close as you can get to young people on the cusp of Bardolatry. We asked her how she takes advantage of pop culture in her classroom to deepen students’ understanding and appreciation of the Bard. Stefanie Jochman is a high school English teacher in Richmond, Virginia, and a 2014 alumna of the Folger’s Teaching Shakespeare Institute, to which she returned in 2016 as a Master Teacher. Jochman is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published November 27, 2018. ©Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Strong Passion is Impressed in Youth” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Steve Clark at WCVE Public Radio in Richmond.

Should college students be required to study Shakespeare? As American universities examine the role of the liberal arts and humanities in our society, what will—and what should—happen to the Bard’s place in English curricula? The Shakespeare Requirement, novelist (and creative writing professor) Julie Schumacher’s new academic satire, asks just that. Jason Fitger, hero of Julie Schumacher’s 2014 novel Dear Committee Members, returns in her new book. The tactless and ineffective Fitger is now chair of the fictional Payne University’s English department, and he’s been tasked with marshaling the department’s faculty to approve a new Statement of Vision. One obstacle is Dennis Cassovan, the department’s elderly Shakespeare scholar, who insists that the Statement include a required semester of Shakespeare. Hanging in the balance? The English department’s annual budget and its home in Willard Hall’s crumbling basement. Julie Schumacher is a professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of Minnesota. Her novel Dear Committee Members, won the Thurber Prize for American Humor. The New Yorker called it “a comic aria of crankiness, disillusionment, and futility.” Her new novel, The Shakespeare Requirement, was published by Doubleday in 2018. She is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Folger’s Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published November 13, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, ““Mark the Manner of His Teaching,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California, and Randy Johnson and Steve Griffith at Minnesota Public Radio in St. Paul.

What is a knave? How about a varlet? Did people in Shakespeare’s time really throw the contents of their chamber pots out of their windows? And was that, like. . . encouraged? If you’ve ever wondered about the naughty bits of early modern history and culture, Ruth Goodman’s book is for you. How to Behave Badly in Elizabethan England: A Guide for Knaves, Fools, Harlots, Cuckolds, Drunkards, Liars, Thieves, and Braggarts covers all the things we don’t talk about in polite company, including dirty words, bad manners, criminal conduct, and sex. We talked with Goodman about what bad behavior can tell us about Shakespeare’s world and about our society today. Ruth Goodman is an author, historian of British social and domestic life, host of a BBC TV series, and an advisor to the Royal Shakespeare Company. She is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published October 30, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “My Speech Of Insultment Ended On His Dead Body,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California and Aidan Lyons at the Sound Company in London.

For three years, Shakespeare Uncovered has provided a crash course in Shakespeare’s best-known plays, presented in hour-long documentary form and guided by film and theater stars like Morgan Freeman, Kim Cattrall, Ethan Hawke, and Helen Hunt. On the third (and likely final) season of Shakespeare Uncovered, which premiered on PBS on October 12, Brian Cox and Romola Garai make timely investigations of Julius Caesar and Measure for Measure, Helen Hunt looks at the rom-com legacy of Much Ado About Nothing, and Sir Antony Sher probes Richard III's dangerous charms. The people behind the series are TV producers Richard Denton and Nicola Stockley. As the series was gearing up for its third season, the two of them came by the studio to talk about how they create these in-depth episodes and some moments from the series have really knocked their socks off. Richard and Nicola were interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From our Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published October 16, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Makes The Hour Full Complete,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Paul Luke at VoiceTrax West in Studio City, California and Gareth Wood at The Sound Company in London.

Director Peter Sellars once staged "Antony and Cleopatra" in a Harvard dormitory swimming pool. His King Lear owned a Lincoln Continental. His work is complex. But what confounds some audience members has also won him ardent fans. One of them is Ayanna Thompson, a scholar of Shakespeare and performance studies who is now director of the Arizona Center for Medieval & Renaissance Studies at Arizona State University. Thompson’s new book, the latest in Bloomsbury’s "Shakespeare in the Theatre" series, explores Sellars’s influences and tracks the predominant theme of his work: a laser-like focus on race in America. We talked with Thompson and Sellars himself about what can be gained from striving to understand the impenetrable. Thompson and Sellars are interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the "Shakespeare Unlimited" podcast series. Published October 2, 2018. ©Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “I Understand Thee Well,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Andrew Feliciano and Evan Marquart at Voice Trax West in Studio City, California and Brian Mendez at public radio station KJZZ in Phoenix. Special thanks to Julia Carnahan, Peter Sellars’s assistant, for her help in making this interview possible.

The family. The cottage. The age difference. The pregnancy. The children. The second best bed. The grave. We know so little about Anne Hathaway, but it hasn’t stopped us from speculating about her life for the past 300 years. In this episode, we talk to Katherine Scheil, a professor of English at the University of Minnesota, about the many, many versions of Anne Hathaway. In her new book, Imagining Shakespeare's Wife: The Afterlife of Anne Hathaway, Scheil looks at how historians, biographers, and novelists have repeatedly reinterpreted and reshaped Hathaway’s image over the centuries, and why. Scheil is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published September 18, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “Thy Dear Self's Better Part" was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer.

Since the 1990s, playwright and actor Steven Berkoff has been traveling the world performing a one-actor show called "Shakespeare’s Villains." It’s fitting, coming from the actor perhaps best known for playing Beverly Hills Cop’s Victor Maitland, that Berkoff promotes the show’s examination of Iago, Shylock, Richard III, the Macbeths, and others as “A Master Class in Evil.” Now, Berkoff has made a film of his performance. With additional material from "Henry V," it’s called "Shakespeare’s Heroes and Villains." We invited Steven Berkoff in to give us his thoughts on what Shakespeare’s villains have in common and why they hold such an enduring appeal. Berkoff is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the "Shakespeare Unlimited" podcast series. Published September 4, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “I Am Alone the Villain of the Earth,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer.

Here’s the assignment. Fourteen lines in iambic pentameter, with an a-b-a-b, c-d-c-d, e-f-e-f, g-g rhyme scheme. Now: add Taylor Swift. It’s astounding and gratifying that Shakespeare—a 450-year-old playwright—continues to pop up in popular culture. Our guest on this podcast episode is Erik Didriksen, who takes hit songs from artists like Taylor Swift and Eminem and rewrites them as Shakespearean sonnets. The Tumblr where Didriksen posted his sonnets became so popular that in 2015, he published a book, Pop Sonnets: Shakespearean Spins on Your Favorite Songs. He was interviewed by Barbara Bogaev (This episode was originally broadcast February 10, 2016). From our Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. ©Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This episode, called "Press Among the Popular Throngs," was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is web producer. With help from Bob Auld and Deb Stathopulos at the Radio Foundation in New York and Phil Richards and Matt Holzman at KCRW public radio in Santa Monica, California. Erik Didriksen’s pop-sonnets are read by Elyse Mirto and Bo Foxworth of The Antaeus Theater Company in Los Angeles.

Joe Papp was responsible for some of modern American theater's most iconic institutions: New York City's free Shakespeare in the Park. The Public Theater. The whole idea of "Off-Broadway." We spoke with Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan about Papp's life and work, from his hardscrabble childhood, through the frightening era of Joe McCarthy, to the founding of Shakespeare in the Park and the Public. Ken's epic oral history of the early years of the New York Shakespeare Festival and the Public Theater, "Free for All: Joe Papp, the Public, and the Greatest Theater Story Ever Told," published in 2009. He spent untold hours with Papp and also talked with New York politicians, Broadway producers, and seeming everyone else who helped Papp make Shakespeare in the Park a reality, including actors James Earl Jones, George C. Scott, Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, Colleen Dewhurst, Tommy Lee Jones, and a Staten Island car-wash employee who would go on to play Romeo under the name of Martin Sheen. Ken is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the "Shakespeare Unlimited" podcast series. Published August 7, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. This podcast episode, "This Green Plot Shall Be Our Stage," was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer. It was edited by Gail Kern Paster and Esther Ferington. Ben Lauer is the web producer. We had technical help from Lauren Cascio and Nick Bozzone at Formosa Commercials recording studio in Santa Monica, California.

In 2011, Ben Steinfeld and Noah Brody, co-directors of New York’s Fiasco Theater, were invited to an assisted living facility and nursing home just outside New York City to work with its residents on a production of "A Midsummer Night’s Dream." Because it was The Lillian Booth Actors Home—a facility filled with retired singers, actors, dancers and musicians—Ben and Noah expected to work with a group of seasoned Broadway professionals. While there were some, the cast they finally assembled was largely anything but. Ben and Noah were invited on this adventure by filmmakers Jilann Spitzmiller and Hank Rogerson, who turned the process into a documentary called Still Dreaming. We talk about the experience with Ben Steinfeld and Hank Rogerson. Hank Rogerson is a filmmaker who, with Jilann Spitzmiller, produced Still Dreaming. Ben Steinfeld is co-artistic director of Fiasco Theater. He co-directed, with Noah Brody, the Lillian Booth Actors Home’s production of "A Midsummer Night’s Dream." Hank and Ben are interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the "Shakespeare Unlimited" podcast series. Published July 24, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, “A Dream Past the Wit of Man,” was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer.

What did everyday life look like for women throughout Tudor society? A new social history, "The Hidden Lives of Tudor Women by Elizabeth Norton," introduces us not only to the restrictions, but also to some of the surprising freedoms that touched these women’s lives. Hear the stories of remarkable women who owned businesses, stood up to kings, and lived independently. Elizabeth Norton is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published July 10, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, Talkest Thou Nothing but of Ladies?, was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer.

“How is it possible for a whole country to fall into the hands of a tyrant? That’s a deeply unsettling question that Shakespeare grappled with again and again.” Stephen Greenblatt’s new book, "Tyrant," explores tyranny in Shakespeare’s plays. In the 100th episode of Shakespeare Unlimited, we talk with the eminent Shakespeare scholar about characters like Richard III and Macbeth; how societies allow tyranny to pop up; and how and why Shakespeare used its depiction in his work to stir the audiences of his time. Stephen Greenblatt is the John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University. "Tyrant" was published in 2018 by W. W. Norton & Company. Greenblatt is interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. From the Shakespeare Unlimited podcast series. Published June 26, 2018. © Folger Shakespeare Library. All rights reserved. This podcast episode, "He Affects Tyrannical Power" was produced by Richard Paul. Garland Scott is the associate producer.