Shakespeare
Volume 2, Issue 2
SPRING 1998

SHAKESPEARE'S FROWARD FEMALES

Women's Language: Wit, Seduction, and Silence
Wendy Greenhill, the education director of the RSC, discusses the verbal weapons women use.

Are Shakespeare's Women Unruly?
Jeanne Addison Roberts shows what happens to them at the end of the plays.

Is Kate Submissive or Subversive?  Three Directors, Three Answers
Peggy O'Brien, co-director of the current Shenandoah Shakespeare Express production, gives her opinion.  Jill Kuhnle describes two Stratford Ontario productions. 

Is Kate Submissive or Subversive?  What Actors Say
Judith Elstein interviews the Kate and Petruchio of the ’97 Stratford Festival production.

TEACHING WOMEN'S ISSUES

Slang Opens our Eyes to Attitudes about Kate
Mary Mastrandrea launches an aggressive introduction to pinpoint attitudes about males and females.

Learning Logs Lead to Discoveries about Women's Issues
Patti Slagle's skillfully worded prompts help students see women in a stronger light.

Do Women in the Comedies Get Married and Live Happily Ever After?  Act It Out and See
Michael J. Collins uses a performance exercise to challenge the concept of traditional happy endings.

Raising Awareness of Fathers and Daughters
Wendy Michaels designs activities to better understand Portia and Jessica.

Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia in Trevor Nunn's 1996 film of Twelfth Night,
photo by Alex Bailey, courtesy of Fine Line Features.

FEATURED ARTICLES

Shakespeare in an All Girl's School
Virginia Byrne stages The Comedy of Errors.

"Luciana kept looking and sounding like Goldie Hawn; Adriana recalled for me Ruth Buzzy; Egeon was simply Arte Johnson's 'dirty old man.'  My vision continued into large cut-outs of flowers, bell-bottoms, platform shoes...and suddenly it was there.  Of course--the 1970's and Laugh-In."

Staging the Classroom
Kristen McDermott uses performance to spark learning in her college classroom.

"On the first day of class,...I hand out the syllabus and mingle, answering questions but not beginning class formally.  A few minutes after the start of class, I wander into the 'performance space' and, without warning, launch loudly into the first six or eight lines of 'O, for a muse of fire....'  Attention is quickly galvanized and there are some nervous giggles.  I then explain to students that they are configured much as Shakespeare's audience would have been, and that one of his plays might have begun with little more fanfare than that."

Alternative Shakespeare:  Screenplays in the Classroom
Frank Ceruzzi compares scripts used for movies with Shakespeare's texts.

"The screenplay has the potential to help students and teachers rethink notions of textual authority and interpretation.  Recent scholarship in performance pedagogy has helped in overcoming a closed reading of Shakespeare's play scripts, moving students away from the notion of the ideal or fixed text and getting them to think about the acts of performance and interpretation.  But in addition to student performances of Shakespeare, looking closely at a director's vision might also be helpful in rethinking notions of textual authority."

BROADSHEET
Early modern documents about conduct for marriage partners.

NEWS ON THE RIALTO
A compendium of courses, conferences, and summer theatre performances around the world. 

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Last updated April 03, 2003.
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