Gossip Wench here, your one and only source into the scandalous lives of the Thespian elite. An anonymous source has told me that Will Shakespeare might not be as genius as we all thought he was…

Thought his pastoral, mythological, wit-filled plays were all his own ideas? Our source says think again. All we’re saying is maybe buy a ticket for Lyly’s Galatea before you fight for a place in Will’s entourage. #ad 

You didn’t hear it from us, but this actor trying to be a playwright seems pretty sad…maybe you just weren’t cut out for the stage? Don’t get me wrong, he’s getting pretty popular. But

if you’re going to copy the framework of someone’s play, at least keep the chastity agenda: it’s not classy having fulfilled desires as the solution of your plot. Elizabeth wouldn’t approve of this trashiness taking over the stage, and neither do we… take a cold shower, Slagspeare.

We all wrote our book reports on Pyramus and Thisbe in middle school, and we’re kind of over it now. Using an ass instead of a stag sums up the difference between Ovid and our pal Will: stop trying to make Metamorphoses for the common people happen…it’s not going to happen. 

I don’t know about you gossipers but we’re off to the Globe tonight to see what all the fuss is about. It’s not all doom and gloom though, Drama Boy, as your fans say you’ve got a way with words; let’s see if it’s enough!

Midsummer Night’s Dream? Or Midsummer Night’s Scheme…

xoxo, Gossip Wench. 

Charlotte Slinger, Holly Mawdsley, Pearl Andrews-Horrigan, Phoebe Hearst.

I had lately travelled to the city of London, and in my time there did experience going to one of the playhouses that are of such fashion and popularity amongst many in the city. This day that I crossed the river to attend those playhouses is here recounted for any who wish to walk a similar course in their own travels. 

But before I can make descriptions of those busy playhouses, it would be ill of me not to make mention of my troubles in getting to them. I was instructed by a friend before my arrival to travel by carriage where possible but, finding the roads packed with carriages at a standstill, and being told by the proprietor of my lodgings that these were stuffed with others travelling towards the playhouses, I elected to travel by water-taxi to the opposite bank of the river. This is most recommended, for to travel on foot takes one through the stink and bustle of the London Bridge, on which is a great deal of filth, and above which is an indescribable adornment, best avoided.

I first travelled to the Rose amphitheatre, having been told of a performance of Doctor Faustus was occurring that afternoon. It is the oddest building. Like the other open-air playhouses on this south bank, it seems modelled after it’s neighbours, the bearpit and other animal-baiting houses: galleries looking down as if we are to see the actors tear one another to shreds. I have even heard that it was built without a stage so that players could perform one day, and beasts fight one another the next. However, upon my late arrival, I found the actors already retreating under the weight of hisses and heckles from the crowd.

From here I travelled to the Globe Theatre, where the tragedy of King Lear was being enacted. This was a far more agreeable experience, as the placement of my seating ensured that raucous activity in the yard down below could be avoided. My cushioned chair meant my status could be projected, and showcased alongside the acting. However, the ghastly acoustics proved tiresome, as the lengthy play needed my undivided attention. I was not surprised at the vocal responses of the audience, as I too was compelled to comment on the players’ abilities to act so convincingly onstage. Benefit came from the actors delivering their speech up toward my seating and not toward the lowly crowd below. The mere cast of fifteen people proved an intimate performance, and the spectacle of bloodshed at Caesar’s death was a most enthralling yet disturbing experience. I could smell the metallic syrup in the air, as this side of the river was a dark and dangerous place. This proved to be a fanciful twist of fate for the protagonist, as the masses were particularly engrossed in his performance. Prior to this, I saw the very same player in Hamlet, and whilst being completely different in plot, his performance was almost identical. Perhaps the playwright forgot his originality. Yet the tense atmosphere dominated the whole performance, which I see as the best sign of a successful play. All in all a most thrilling evening of theatre.

By Ross, Felix, Francesca and Rebecca.

What can historical documents like Philip Henslowe’s diary tell us about the experience of 

(a) performing

Actors’ experience of performing in early modern plays is in some ways incomparable to the experience of actors today. With senior actors forming theatre companies and performing  exclusively for this company – which they had a financial interest in, receiving shares of the profits from each play – the instability of freelance actors today was only experienced by young or unestablished actors hired only for walk-on parts in the final few days before performances. This company structure meant that actors were always working with the same people, and likely playing the same parts/types of parts due to typecasting  – Shakespeare often did not even name his characters, instead using their generic type, such as ‘Fool’, as their identifier in speech prefixes – with Stern explaining that modern editors “discover” the characters’ names for publication today, as modern readers have novelistic expectations (65). Stern also suggests that type casting lead to “Less need for any actor to work on issues of characterisation” (65), as actors essentially played themselves.       

Actors – or at least those who weren’t sharers in the company – were also trusted less, and therefore only given cue scripts with their lines and cue lines, and did not receive a full playtext. This was to ensure that were unable to sell the script to publishers for their own profit, rather than that of the company.   This also meant, however, that the actors did not know the full plot of the play before performances,which inevitably affected their performances. The celebrated style of acting in the early modern period was therefore very different to that which wins awards today, with actors focussing purely on the emotions displayed within their lines – for example, through the dialogue switching from prose to verse.  This is what actors would focus on in sessions with their instructors – more senior actors or in the case of the most established actors, such as Richard Burbage, the playwright himself who help them – when practicing their parts. This process of instruction, though, was often dictatorial – the focus was on showing the emotions, not discussing or understanding them. As Stern’s Stage Traffic states, it was in this way that “‘Correct’ action and gestures continued to be taught for the next two centuries”[p.83], and the ’passions’ these evoked were thus passed on & repeated to become characteristic of that part.

Early modern rehearsal practices, then, were very different to those of today.  There were no extensive group rehearsals – only one before performance night at a push.  It is almost unimaginable that this would be the cas today, except for specifically billed ‘24 hour plays’.

This was evidently in contrast to the way plays are treated in contemporary production companies today, where they are taken on tour for months and intensely rehearsed in a group dynamic.

(b) being in the audience of an early modern play? 

The theatre today is considered as a high-brow, formal institution, which differs from early modern theatre. As we can see from Philip Henslow’s diary, the theatre was cheap, so accessible to the lower classes. It was mass-produced entertainment, so less exclusive. There was the option to stand for the whole show, which would have been cheaper. Theatre was the main source of entertainment, so spectators would expect lots of variety and different plays everyday. Philip Henslow’s diary shows this, as everyday different plays were shown. There was also less etiquette in the theatre. For example, audience members would leave once the main character died, even if the play wasn’t over

Philip Henslowe’s Diary 

This historical document belonged to the owner/founder of the Rose Theatre in early modern London, and lists the dates, frequency and profits of the plays shown there. It also includes lists of props and costumes owned by theatre, and records of payments to actors and writers. This is valuable in not only showing the development of acting as an official/professional form of income, but also suggests that other contributors to the theatre experience existed offstage such as costume design, which was most likely done by women at the time.

(c) What strikes you as the most unusual aspect of the theatre from this period? 

The most unusual aspect of the theater from this period is the lack of full rehearsals prior to performing the play. This would have resulted in a performance that felt disjointed in comparison to the way we experience live theater today. The lack of full rehearsals would also have resulted in a play that wasn’t as cohesive as plays today – the play would feel, to a modern audience, more like a series of separate people reading parts.  

Phoebe, Holly, El, Charlotte, Pearl

The Theatrical Time Manipulation Company.

Lords and Ladies, warlocks of this age of technological wonder, please take a moment from your busy lives and buzzing devices to consider the past. Once shrouded by the time manipulation legislation, the no deal Galaxy E-exit (Earth Exit) has allowed us to take control of our own spacetime. For the small price of £1bn we are allowing you the opportunity to travel back in time to renaissance England:

It is my honour to be able to present to you an exclusive experience of Shakespearean theatre in London! I have had the privilege of going behind the curtain to present to you now: the mechanics of the theatre.

Have you ever wondered how Elizabethan actors (renowned for performing multiple parts of multiple plays in a single week) are actually capable of this? One way they approached this was by using cue lines – a way of writing scripts which only gave an actor a copy of their own written lines, interjected with a prompt word or phrase they would listen out for to known when to come onstage or start speaking. In fact, often actors would never even hear the play in full before it was performed – which is why often there could be confusion or miscommunication onstage. (1)

I am also free to share why you can expect to see so many plays which use a tragic structure – typically ending with the death of multiple main characters. This trend was born due to the fact that many audience members tended to lose interest and leave the play once characters played by well known and liked actors died. This encouraged Shakespeare, along with other playwrights, to begin to group the deaths of the characters in the end scene more and more. Therefore, this version of celebrity and popular culture began to directly influence the structure and conventions of some plays. (2)

Actors in Shakespeare’s time were When you sign up for our Mega Premium Package, not only will you be able to watch up to five plays, but you will also be able to watch the same play under different circumstances. Hurl fruit at Kempe the slow-witted fool (Stern, 67) as he improvises yet another line (67). Then, not even a day later, allow your child to experience the merriment of hurling the very same apple at the so-called ‘wise’ fool Robert Armin during one of his pretentious performances (70). Stare in awe as Richard Burbage nails yet another line (72), and then immediately travel to the very first performance of Hamlet right after Burbage’s death, and join the masses in booing the mediocre replacement off the stage. Witness the theatre of the past, where actors only received one or two rehearsal before being thrust onto the stage to fumble their lines (87); where female characters were preformed by boys, who may, on occasion, sing without missing notes (71). Witness these boys’ journey as they grow from pre-pubescent actors to men (70). Buy our Mega Premium Package today for an incredible 5% discount.

Reviews:

“Once we departed the floating flickering cities of the year 22149, there was a momentary pause. The assistant who took our payments at the beginning of the day before making us wait for however long, assured us everything was okay and that ‘this was normal’. After a few shakes and shudders the lift dropped suddenly. He handed each of us our individual guises, mine consisted of a silk doublet, coloured garters and embroidered gloves. We were told to keep our heads down and hands firmly into our pockets, the whole experience felt strange and alien, not surprising I guess considering the 6-century gap. However, slightly disappointed with the overall experience, the way my fiancé described it made it sound an unmissable opportunity. So far, I have had to hop over numbers of beggars, stepped into puddles of faeces every ten metres and also am now dressed up in all the colours of the old world. It was 1:45 pm and we were slowly walking down Southbank, there was a mass of people outside the front and in my mind, I thought we’d be outside for hours. We paid for the best seats in the house, 4 English pennies, not to just be able to see everything but ‘to be seen as well’, a young man dressed in a waistcoat and perfectly polished shoes offered us tea and ale. Looking around the theatre, I realised quickly it was an open-air theatre, my mind became concerned for the ruffians in the standing area, huddling together for warmth, all of this so they can watch Mr Burbidge prance around.”

Disclaimer:

The Theatrical Time Manipulation Company cannot be held responsible for the contraction of any ancient diseases, loss of personal belongings, loss of life, witch persecution or visits to the gallows.

Tiffany Stern, ‘Rehearsal, performance and plays’

“Lesser actors may never have heard in full the text of the play in which they were to perform…Actors would be given their separate parts to take home and learn. These parts consisted of their own lines only…” (p76-77)

“The playwright Glapthorne, in his Ladies Privilege (1640), refers to spectators who make the author ‘end his play before his plot be done’: the onlookers had a disturbing tendency to go away before the play was fully over.” (p73)

GENERAL NOTES

• Audience suspending sense of disbelief- overacting (less realistic than today- focusing on “passions” (Stern)), boys dressed as “beautiful” women, props and costumes less realistic (Bottom turning into a donkey)
• Actors focusing on “passions” (Stern) – certain parts of the audience not being able to see/hear as well, focus on big gestures as opposed to subtlety
• More disruptions to performance due to less preparation, rowdiness of the audience affecting the actors
• Poorer people having chaotic experience due to weather, drunk people. Noise from outside of the theatre, e.g. pleasure houses, cockfighting, bullbaiting
• Violence of cockfighting, bullbaiting etc outside the theatre was representative of what people wanted to see, violence
• The plague- theatre could have been a dangerous experience particularly for poorer people due to the exposure to illness
• Poorer people encountering things/people on stage that they wouldn’t in real life, i.e. royals, people from different countries (the Swiss Traveller’s account of a play about “diverse nations”)
• Multiple theatres in one area, added a  competitive element, companies trying to have big names, choosing plays with the most drama
• Music in the theatre, luring people in, competiting with outside noise and noise of the audience
• Only in England where women couldn’t act, Swiss traveller’s account that there were men dressed as women shows how a foreign perspective highlights peculiarities about theatre during this time. Less documented by Londoners as theatre was normal part of life
• Travelling- more exhaustion during play due to journey? Poorer people taking the boat vs rich people taking a carriage
• Audience had a more personal relationship to the actors (and therefore to the characters) due to seeing them previously in different plays. Attracted people to see their favourite actors

CREATIVE RESPONSE

When this thing gets up to 88 miles per hour, you’re gonna see some serious Shakespeare… 

Great Scott! The streets are filthy and there’s a raucous going on around the corner. It can only mean one thing- we’re in Shakespeare’s London! 

Don’t panic, the abundance of diseases won’t get you (well, no promises…), we’re only here for a short trip to the theatre. We’ve plenty to choose from here on a fine late 1500s afternoon South side of the Thames, with theatres practically fighting for you to knuckle down in their yard and cheer and jeer for the classics such as Doctor Faustus and Julius Caesar. Shakespeare didn’t have a monopoly over drama in London, and there’s a fair amount of competition amongst the playhouses. One of these popular playhouses is Philip Henslowe’s The Rose, which became home to the Admiral’s Men acting company in 1592. With more and more buildings and acting troupes popping up, theatre’s started to get creative to maintain business. Extensions, extra stage levels and added seating were some of the ways in which theatre’s tried to entice more audience members in. 

Henslow’s actually a pretty useful guy; his diaries have told us a fair bit about the theatre industry around here, so we aren’t completely thrown into the unknown. One particularly interesting tidbit is a list of props and equipment the theatre had:

Item, i rock, i cage, i tomb, i Hell mouth… i bedstead.

Item, viii lances, i pair of stairs for Phaethon*.

Item, i globe, & i golden sceptre; iii clubs

Item, i golden fleece, ii racquets, i bay tree.

Item, i lion’s skin, i bear’s skin; Phaethon’s

limbs, & Phaethon’s chariot, & Argus’s head.

Item, Iris’s head, & rainbow; i little altar. . .

i ghost’s gown; i crown with a sun*.

It can be hard to imagine what things had been crafted for performance, given the lack of smoke machines and strobe lights. Yet the Elizabethan theatre did make use of certain effects such as smoke and cannons, they weren’t afraid of pyrotechnics to aid the drama of a performance. Parading a golden sceptre and lion’s skin around on the stage brings a certain regality to a performance, don’t you think? 

If you’re feeling ever so-so, or just want to save yourself the backache, you can cough up a couple of pennies (yes, pennies!) and nab a seat in an upper tier of the theatre. This is where the line between the low and the high class is drawn. Higher seats = better view = better public image. 

The Globe Theatre, built from the remains of The Theatre (England’s second ever permanent playhouse), is the longtime home of Shakespeare’s dramatics, and it’s existed since 1599. Granted, it’s been reconstructed since then into what we can visit in the present day, but this is the birthplace of the ‘box office’. No, really: boxes that collected everyone’s admission were a sure way of determining how successful a certain play was, ie in how much money it actually made the theatre.  Being so famous nowadays, it clearly did quite well for itself. 

Watch out for pickpockets as you muscle your way into the land of the ‘groundlings’ (us folk that hang out in the theatre’s yard), the theatre going experience wasn’t quite as policed as it is today. One familiar thing, however, is the chance to purchase yourself some refreshments. You needn’t wait until any interval, as food and drink is available during the performance. Try not to spill your hazelnuts on your neighbour. You’ll need them to throw about when your favourite character kicks the bucket (spoilers!). We’re a pretty rowdy bunch, and I bet you two pennies that a good few people will leave the theatre before the end. You couldn’t imagine doing that in modern times, but here, once a main character dies, some people have simply had enough. Pass the tissues. 

If you’re still bloodthirsty (weren’t all those murders enough?), we can head out into the streets and follow the squawks and cheers to the cockfights. The setup actually looks a bit like a theatre, giving us a great view of the violence once more, but instead of passionating, there’s a lot of pecking. Some traveller’s accounts have told us that people would be there to take bets, so maybe you can even make your money back and we can do all of this again tomorrow. I hear they’re performing a second part to Tamburlaine. See you in the pit!