SHAKESPEARE TODAY
Shakespeare’s plays have been read and performed for over 400 years. Most students study some of his work in school from Year 9. There have been changes in how Shakespeare’s work is presented over the years, and it is sometimes quiet different to how the plays would have originally been performed.
Place of Performance
In Shakespeare’s time, plays were performed either in the yards of inns, private home or later in dedicated buildings after the first theatre was built. The theatre’s, like today’s Globe, would have been open to the elements and therefore very severe weather could lead to a performance being cancelled. Over time, performances in theatres became the norm, and while some theatres had different layouts, they would have been similar in terms of having a stage, seating, a backstage area, and bigger venues would have had balconies with more seating. More recently however, there has been a trend for plays to be held outside again during the summer months. For example, in Wales, there is an annual Shakespeare play performed in the grounds of the Abergavenny castle. For films and tv adaptations, performances take place in studios and sometimes in different places around the world.
Inside The Globe in London
The Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford
Abergavenny Castle in Wales where Shakespeare is performed in the Summer
Another difference between performance venues in Shakespeare’s times and now is comfort that audience experience. In Elizabethan times there would have been no comfortable seating, no clean toilet facilities and the audience would have been at the mercy of the weather, getting cold and wet, or getting sunburn. Today, most theatre seats are comfortable, theatres have heating and air conditioning and lots of toilet facilities.
Electricity and Lighting
In Elizabethan England there was no electricity, so lighting, if used at all, for effect or for performances indoors, would have been candle or torchlight. Because of these limitations, performances were mainly held during the hours of daylight. Today, lighting plays a huge part in performances, from the general lights in theatres, to the stage lights used for lighting effects, spot lights and so on. We rely much more on lighting in performances today to create mood and convey atmosphere.
Audience
Audiences are quite different today. In Shakespeare’s time, plays were aimed at the masses, from poor people who were not literate and who had never left their town or country, to Queen Elizabeth herself. The audience were not expected to sit in silence, but they would have chatted, shouted out, and interacted with the actors. They could eat and drink during performances, go out and come back in and so on. In the 20th Century the majority of audience members were literate and generally middle class or higher. They would have studied his work at school. Their experience was different as well because Shakespeare was seen as high art and you would have to be silent during performances and eating and drinking or leaving and going back in was not allowed. Today there is more of a combination. You can pay a lot of money for some performances and attend plays where there is a big performer/audience divide, but there are also many venues and performances where audience members are interacted with, and in outdoor performances, for example the ones at Abergavenny Castle, people are encouraged to bring picnics.
Makeup and costume
In Elizabethan times, heavy makeup was used by the actors, but the makeup could cause health problems because there was a lot of lead in it. Today, while makeup is used, it is safe. Make up is sometimes subtle, but at other times it is used to create incredible effects, like glow in the dark features. With better makeup and experienced makeup artists, actors can be made to look convincingly older, younger, male or female, or not human at all.
In Shakespeare’s times, costumes would have been mainly their own clothes, with added items like capes. Today, it depends on the context the play is set in. Actors may be dressed in Elizabethan era clothing, or jeans and t-shirts, or elaborate costumes.
SFX and Staging
We now have the ability to create and use many different types of special effects for plays on stage and on screen. There are many different lighting effects that can be created, complex sound systems with computers can make a range of sound effects and play complex backing tracks. On screen, CGI can be used too. With better technology stages can rotate and rise or fall. This all means that sometimes today’s performances can be much more complex and challenging. There are however performances that are still quite simple in terms of staging and SFX however.
Context, Time and Place
While Shakespeare set his places in several different times and places, for many years those performances contexts have stayed the same. There are however, many performances that are now set in different times, places and contexts. For example, a number of years ago there was a performance at The Globe where the play was set in the 1930s. There have been performances set in 70s, the 90s/00s, in Japan, in Africa etc. Today directors like to explore how Shakespeare’s work can be relevant for different times and places – the stories of love, power struggles, betrayal and magic, are stories found everywhere. For example, The Globe had a long festival where performances of Shakespeare’s plays were set in different countries and performed in different languages.
The 1957 film Throne of Blood, by legendary Japanese director Kurosawa, was a Japanese interpretation of Macbeth, set in the Samurai period.
(Screen shot of Throne of Blood)
Language
Aside from the performance of Shakespeare in different languages, we also play today with putting Shakespeare into modern speech, into rap, into sign language. Directors are always exploring ways to disseminate Shakespeare’s work to wider audience, and to make it relevant to their experiences.
Types of Performances
While In Shakespearean times plays were performed on stage or perhaps in a noble person’s house, today we have many more ways of present his work to the public.
· Live performances in theatres
· Live performances outside
· TV adaptations
· Film adaptations
· Radio adaptations (narrated and full cast performances)
· Animated versions
· Performances that have been recorded in a theatre and then shown in cinemas, either live or at a later date.
The fact that there is a call for all these methods shows how relevant and popular Shakespeare’s work is today. In some ways, despite the methods, this is nearer to Shakespeare’s time as the work is accessible to all people in society.
Gender
One of the key things about Elizabethan theatre was that women were not allowed to perform on stage as it was frowned upon. Men and boys therefore played the female roles. Over time however, things have changed, with women eventually being allowed on stage, and then later taking on female and male Shakespearean roles. For example, Charlotte Charke played many male characters including Hamlet in the 18th Century. In fact, there have been many performances where the role of Hamlet has been played by a woman, and recently Maxine Peake stared as Hamlet at the Royal Exchange Theatre. (https://www.theguardian.com/stage/gallery/2014/sep/26/female-hamlets-sarah-bernhardt-maxine-peake-in-pictures).
Another example of gender reversal, or when gender is used as a key concept in contemporary performances would be the Y12 performance of Macbeth here at the Brit. In this production there are no male actors at all. We are also exploring the issues of gender equality and stereotyping in the performance. For example, do we view women performing the violent deeds differently from how we view men doing the same things? How do we balance gender equality without losing what makes us women? In fact, what does make us women?
Shakespeare’s work will remain valid and relevant – his stories tell the stories of our lives, and can be appreciated in almost any culture around the world. We all love, we all experience betrayal, and we all experience power struggles. We can relate to his work because it is based on human experience that does not change in essence over time.
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