Experiencing Shakespeare: From Page to Stage

Overview

Course No. 20070
Experience Shakespeare’s plays from the other side of the stage with a rare peek behind the curtain to see how productions are brought to life for the modern audience.

If you’ve ever been curious about everything that goes into an authentic production of a Shakespeare play, our new series, Experiencing Shakespeare: From Page to Stage, gives you the rare chance to peek behind the curtains.

Professor Alissa Branch, award-winning actor, director, and creator of an advanced Shakespeare performance curriculum, shows us in 12 riveting lessons how today’s actors go about exploring, rehearsing, and performing his plays. With help from two professional stage actors, Brooke and Kam, you will be guided on an exploration of specific tools modern actors use in rehearsal to unlock Shakespeare’s verse and bring his plays to life onstage.

Along with the insider’s look into how actors and directors dive into the texts, you will also receive an intimate, behind-the-scenes peek at the rehearsal process and the designing and directing of the plays. From decisions made during practice to the myriad of jobs needed to support the actors, there are a staggering number of responsibilities.

You will get an unprecedented inside glimpse into the playwright’s background, theater culture in the Elizabethan era, and the acting toolbox Shakespeare embedded in his plays—all of which will come together to bring you a richer appreciation of the genius behind his words.

Video Lectures

1. Reading versus Watching Shakespeare (26 min)
   Join Professor Alissa Branch and dive behind the scenes to find out why, more than 400 years after his death, his plays persist in being among the most staged.
2. Plays in the Elizabethan Age (25 min)
   Learn about theater culture in the Elizabethan era to get a deeper, humanized understanding of his texts for performance purposes.
3. Secrets of Shakespeare’s Verse (23 min)
   Learn the brilliant tricks that Shakespeare used to give clues and hints to actors, including his use of iambic pentameter.
4. Discovering Shakespeare’s Characters (30 min)
   The modern actor uses newer psychological tools to decide how to play their roles, yet human troubles remain the same through the ages.
5. Shakespearean Rhetoric and Wordplay (21 min)
   Examine how Shakespeare makes use of rhetoric to inform actors on how to make the characters come alive.
6. What Soliloquies Reveal (36 min)
   Learn how Shakespeare writes his soliloquies in a way conducive to breaking the “fourth wall.”
7. How Shakespeare Uses Prose (19 min)
   Turn your attention from verse to prose and examine the shifts that provide instruction on characters’ feelings.
8. Shakespeare’s Creative Imagery (18 min)
   Discover how Shakespeare utilized 17,677 words, invented new ones, and innovated how they were used.
9. Rehearsing the Role: Shakespeare’s Tragedies (29 min)
   Take a behind-the-scenes look at the rehearsal process, beginning with an initial read-through.
10. Rehearsing the Role: Shakespeare’s Comedies (30 min)
    Explore how Shakespearean comedy relies on well-known comic devices like “mistaken identity.”
11. Designing and Directing Shakespeare’s Plays (30 min)
    Expand your look into the many behind-the-scenes jobs required for a production of this level.
12. To the Stage! (22 min)
    Enjoy as the team brings this study to culmination by skillfully performing scenes from Julius Caesar, Twelfth Night, and Hamlet.