American Shakespeare Center an International Source for Study

STAUNTON, Va. - March 2, 2016 - PRLog -- Crossing seasons and time zones is not an uncommon journey for scholars visiting the American Shakespeare Center. This week, a scholar from the southern-most state in Australia, Victoria, will be visiting. Rob Conkie, Senior Lecturer, Honors and Postgraduate Coordinator in Theatre and Drama from La Trobe University is here to observe current and archival performances. Dr. Conkie’s teaching and research incorporates practical and theoretical approaches to Shakespeare in performance.  Recently, ten scholars visited ASC, one from Dubai.

Going the Distance

Scholars travel to Staunton, Virginia because it is one of only two places where audiences can see Shakespeare’s works performed on an authentically reconstructed stage using the staging of his period.  Scholars who want to understand what Shakespeare's work may have looked like when performed in his day can only do that at Shakespeare's Globe in London, and at Staunton's American Shakespeare Center at the Blackfriars Playhouse in Staunton.

No other company performs Shakespeare's work in a “true” repertory season where each of the dozen actors has one or more roles in every play. Moreover, performances use the same staging and rehearsal conditions of Shakespeare's day. In the current  Actors Renaissance Season, actors learn lines using cue scripts and the actors direct themselves.  This unique method of working -- and ASC’s open rehearsal policy -- is irresistible to scholars and colleges from around the world. Oxford scholar Tiffany Stern, the foremost expert on Shakespeare and Early Modern drama, says the Actors' Renaissance Season at ASC is a laboratory. “I get to see performances that are crazy and exciting because they are full of actor choices [in the space itself].” Stern said in an interview. [https://youtu.be/beo530EzJnw?t=46s]



Global Scholars

The ASC regularly hosts visiting scholars from around the world. “We’ve had researchers from as far away as Australia and Asia tour the Playhouse and study our archives,” says Ralph Cohen, Co-founder. ASC maintains a collection which includes video and images of each show produced in the Blackfriars, and materials for each play dating back to ASC’s founding in 1988. The library is open to scholars of drama and theatre, as well as actors and directors.

“Shakespeare is performed around the globe, but, performances in his re-created Blackfriars Theatre offer an opportunity to study how the physical space influences staging choices and interpretations,” says Cohen.

American Scholars

In addition to scholars, ASC welcomes many students of all ages.

This March ASC will host thirty college and university groups from around the country for the intensive program called a “Little Academe”. This is a new record for the ASC.

The “Little Academe” program, 8 years old, functions as a compressed “May-mester” program, individually tailored for the academic institution involved. Program participants are typically coordinated through English and Theatre departments, but some institutions send a wider variety of students, like those involved in their Honors programs. Exchange for college credit varies based on the structure of the home institution.

“The program is immersive,” says Sarah Enloe, Director of Education. “Students watch every performance on our stage and spend a significant time in lectures and discussion.”

She continues, “The advantage for students is seeing the work live, on a stage re-created as closely as possible to Shakespeare’s, while also receiving instruction that carefully considers the impact of producing the work in this way.  We are the only place where this is possible.  Our sister theatres, like Shakespeare’s Globe in London, offer some opportunities for study but none that tie together process and product so thoroughly.  The result is students who have the confidence to, as we say “read the stage” and consider the implications.”

Lifelong learners of all ages travel to Staunton to participate in educational programs provided by ASC. Additionally, ASC hosts educational events elsewhere. This spring ASC will host “Blackfriars x Southwest” in Austin, Texas, as an extension of their biennial scholarly conference. This summer, ASC will take the “No Kidding Shakespeare Camp” participants to the United Kingdom. There, participants will study various locations that were depicted by Shakespeare and shaped his work.

About the American Shakespeare Center

The American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, Virginia, recovers the joys and accessibility of Shakespeare’s theatre, language, and humanity by exploring the English Renaissance stage and its practices through performance and education.  The ASC’s Blackfriars Playhouse, the world’s only re-creation of Shakespeare’s indoor theatre, is open year-round for productions of classic plays, which have been hailed by The Washington Post as "shamelessly entertaining" and by The Boston Globe as "phenomenal…bursting with energy."  Founded in 1988 as Shenandoah Shakespeare Express, the organization became the American Shakespeare Center in 2005 and can be found online at www.americanshakespearecenter.com.

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