Beyond Shakespeare

Recorded live last year, this is the post show discussion of our adaptation of the opening of A Mirror for Magistrates which covers The Fall of Richard II. The audio adaptation is available on the pod now. After the Fall - Post Show Discussion Hosted by Robert Crighton, with Dr Harriet Archer, Professor Thomas Betteridge and Dr Stephen Longstaffe With readers from the company, Liza Graham and Valentina Vinci Professor Thomas Betteridge is Dean of the College of Business, Arts and Social Sciences at Brunel University London. He is an expert in English Reformation history and Tudor drama, a member of the Research Advisory Board for Historic Royal Palaces and a strategic reviewer for the AHRC. Dr Harriet Archer is a lecturer in Early Modern English Literature at the University of St Andrews. Harriet’s research focuses on Tudor attitudes toward textual transmission, cultural production and literary authority, including the Renaissance reception of classical and medieval writing and thought in drama and printed

Speech! Speech! Occasional scenes and speeches from plays, voted for by those you support our work. This is a speech from The Arraignment of Paris by George Peele, recorded live at our Revels season on Saturday 16th December 2023. With Sarah Blake as Diana. For more on the play The Arraignment of Paris visit our playlist on the play - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5rtIlvo8sQ&list=PLflmEwgdfKoIPwhoQevuUw4fqnoYhLk4X For more on George Peele and one of his other plays The Old Wives' Tale - https://audioboom.com/playlists/4635651-the-old-wives-tale-by-george-peele For a playlist covering all his extant and attributed work - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gh7jhyKwrd4&list=PLflmEwgdfKoLEiTrRFvkIeYa0skCLKX7i Our patrons received the scene within this episode in January 2024 - 19 months early! The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi

Recorded live last year, this is our adaptation of the opening of A Mirror for Magistrates which covers The Fall of Richard II. We performed it live, and there were a few issues with the recording, so I've kept the edit fairly simple. The adaptation cuts the second poem on The Two Rogers, trims a few verses, and turns into acting dialogue the editorial meeting in the book.  There was also a post show discussion, which will follow on the pod soon. The Fall of Richard the Second Adapted by Robert Crighton, from the opening of A Mirror for Magistrates. Performed on Thursday 11th April 2024 at the Quay Theatre, Sudbury. A team of writers gather to write a sequel to John Lydgate’s Fall of Princes, to accompany it’s reprinting. They decide to conjure the ghosts of dead figures, having them the wrongs they committed in life. Introduction – Valentina Vinci George Ferrer (conjuring Robert Tresilian) – Liza Graham Henry, Lord Stafford (conjuring Sir Thomas of Woodstock) – Stephen Longstaffe William Baldwin (conjuring

The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus, is the book that is the source for Christopher Marlowe's play. Chapter by chapter we will wander through the twists and turns of this story. Chapter Twenty: How Doctor Faustus desired to see hell, and of the manner how he was used therein   Our patrons also get an exploring session looking in detail at the text - join our chat here. Thunder sfx thanks to zapsplat.com Our patrons received this episode in June 2024 - approx. 14 months early. They have also received the next 14 chapters and exploring sessions! The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi https://ko-fi.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you want to give us some feedback, email us at admin@beyondshakespeare.org, follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram @BeyondShakes or go to our website: https://beyondsha

It's time for some !Spoilers! for Act Four of Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe (discuss attribution with footnotes, please only write on one side of the paper at a time). The play was recorded at The White Bear Theatre on Tuesday 12th December 2023. If you’d like more on this play, there are exploring sessions galore on the YouTube. All our rehearsals, dress run, and rough live mix are on the patreon feed from £5 tier or above. The full cast audio adaptation edit of this will follow later in the year. The recording used throughout this episode is a live mix of the performed play – it’s clearer than the first rough mix and focuses on the text as writ. The final release will be cleaner and a more entertaining listen. Sojourner Hazelwood-Connell – Dido Kit McGuire – Aeneas Karim Kronfli - Iarbus Alex Kapila - Anna Lynsey Beauchamp - Ilioneus Sarah Blake - Nurse Keith Hill - Achates Alexandra Kataigida - Cloanthus Emma Kemp - Cupid Simon Nader - Sergestus Valentina Vinci – Technical

In August 2024, we produced an all day event  Middleton’s Endgame: A Game at Chess LIVE! a pop up Middleton festival at The White Bear in Kennington, featuring a live performance of A Game at Chess, discussions of the play, a look at Middleton’s last public work, the 1626 Lord Mayor’s show, and other selections of writing from across his life. The whole event, as ever, was recorded, and we're releasing these over the next few months. This is episode 1, beginning at the top of the show. The show started with Setting up the Board, which delivered an overview of Thomas Middleton in the 1620’s, and the theatrical context for the play. With readings of some of the sources, letters, and gossip behind the political theatre of the time. The hosts were Robert Crighton and Liza Graham Also featuring the voices of Keith Hill, Simon Nader, Daniel Yabut, Gillian Horgan, Kit McGuire, Sojourner Hazelwood-Connell, Connor Robert-Brown, Valentina Vinci. YouTube playlist of readings of the play. Podcast playlist on the play.

One of our follow on projects from the readings of The Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus has been to try and figure out how the process of adaptation from the book to the play might have happened. Coinciding with the Marlowe Society of America's conference in 2024, we pulled together a short play looking at the writing of the opening of the play. The resulting play Faustus to Faustus - Part One: Enter a Devil by Robert Crighton, was performed at the Royal Albert Pub in Deptford on Wednesday 10th July 2024 and was recorded for the podcast for future release. And this is that release! It's not a perfect recording, as there was a lot background noise and we were pressed for time because of an imminent football match. But the audience were great and it's wonderful to archive their response. NB: The play does involve some swearing. Faustus to Faustus: A Treatise on the Procession of Text from Book to Stage, made Dialogue Wise, concerning the translated text from the German, and the play by

This week we're discussing... (sinister music plays) Horror, and whether we can sensibly describe some of the early modern and medieval drama as Horror? How far can we push a modern genre onto an older form. Joining me in this discussion is Dr Rebekah King, who graduated from Cambridge with a PhD in English looking at how magicians were depicted on the early modern stage. As well as being a researcher, she is an award-winning writer whose recent play ‘Moderation’ followed the lives of social media moderators forced to see the worst things on the internet all day for a living. It transferred from an extended run at the Edinburgh Fringe to the Greenwich Theatre’s ‘pick of the Fringe season’ in October 2023. Dr King has also recently collaborated with composer George Parris on an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s ‘The Shadow’ which premiered at the Royal Academy of Music in January 2024. Substack: https://rebekahkingwriter.substack.com/ Bluesky: @rebekahking.bsky.social Website: https://www.rebekahkingwr

It's time for some !Spoilers! for Act Three of Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe (discuss attribution with footnotes, please only write on one side of the paper at a time). The play was recorded at The White Bear Theatre on Tuesday 12th December 2023. If you’d like more on this play, there are exploring sessions galore on the YouTube. All our rehearsals, dress run, and rough live mix are on the patreon feed from £5 tier or above. The full cast audio adaptation edit of this will follow later in the year. The recording used throughout this episode is a live mix of the performed play – it’s clearer than the first rough mix and focuses on the text as writ. The final release will be cleaner and a more entertaining listen. Sojourner Hazelwood-Connell – Dido Kit McGuire – Aeneas Karim Kronfli - Iarbus Alex Kapila - Anna Lynsey Beauchamp - Ilioneus Sarah Blake - Venus Keith Hill - Achates Alexandra Kataigida - Cloanthus Emma Kemp - Cupid Liza Graham - Juno Simon Nader - Sergestus Valenti

The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus, is the book that is the source for Christopher Marlowe's play. Chapter by chapter we will wander through the twists and turns of this story. Chapter Nineteen: How Doctor Faustus fell into despair with himself, for having put forth a question unto his spirit, they fell at variance, whereupon the rout of Devils appeared unto him, threatening him sharply.   Our patrons also get an exploring session looking in detail at the text - join our chat here. Thunder sfx thanks to zapsplat.com Our patrons received this episode in May 2024 - approx. 14 months early. The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi https://ko-fi.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you want to give us some feedback, email us at admin@beyondshakespeare.org, follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram @Beyond

We were invited to follow the Behind the Scenes journey of the Oxford Mystery Cycle performed at St Edmund Hall on Saturday, 26 April 2025. This is a mix of cast and audience discussion of the event as it was happening. Many thanks to the organisers for inviting us to wander around the event with microphones. Recorded by Liza Graham and Robert Crighton. Watch the plays here! https://medieval.ox.ac.uk/2025/03/21/the-oxford-medieval-mystery-plays-2025-programme/ Listen to our chat with Professor Henrike Lähnemann in the run up to the Cycle - https://audioboom.com/posts/8662793-discussing-the-oxford-medieval-mystery-cycle-2025 Our patrons received most of this episode in advance. The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi https://ko-fi.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you want to give us some feedback, email us at admin@beyondshakespeare.org, fo

Hello! It's time for our next Revels season - discount early bird season tickets are now on sale for our wonderful patrons, become a £1 tier patron to get a cheap rate season pass. Or, wait a week, and free subscribers and those one our mailing list get access too. There are four/five plays in the season, all announced on this episode. The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi https://ko-fi.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you want to give us some feedback, email us at admin@beyondshakespeare.org, follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram @BeyondShakes or go to our website: https://beyondshakespeare.org You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel where (most of) our exploring sessions live - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLa4pXxGZFwTX4QSaB5XNdQ The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is hosted and produced by Robert Crighton. 

We have a new discussion with Professor Laurie Johnson about Leicester's Men, the playing company that ran throughout the early Elizabethan years of professional playing, whose make up, structure and plays have been difficult to pin down. But luckily, Professor Johnson has written a rather excellent book pinning all these as close to down as we might ever get. This was recorded a year ago - apologies to Laurie for the wait! It's currently (still) a tad bit pricey, but hopefully it will drop down to a more affordable price. https://www.cambridge.org/gb/universitypress/subjects/literature/renaissance-and-early-modern-literature/leicesters-men-and-their-plays-early-elizabethan-playing-company-and-its-legacy?format=HB  Laurie Johnson is Professor in English and Cultural Studies at the University of Southern Queensland and, since 2016, has served as President of the Australian and New Zealand Shakespeare Association. He is the author of Shakespeare's Lost Playhouse: Eleven Days at Newington Butts (2018) and has w

It'll be a bit quiet on the pod this week, as we're doing some live shows - tickets available below - but we thought we should update you on some of the online options for our patrons, which you might want to go for. We're doing a basic live stream of rehearsal runs from Tuesday this week, around 3pm each day - become a patron and grab the link. Otherwise, more on this next week when it's all over. Information about the archiving of Entertaining Henry - open access Patreon live rehearsal link and details (you will need to be a patreon from £1 or more) Entertaining Henry is a co-production with The Quay Theatre and Beyond Shakespeare... Let us take you through a whistle-stop tour of the entertainment world from Henry’s reign: from his youthful days to his more fractious later life, we will share the history of his reign through the plays he and his subjects enjoyed. Play along with our Tudor Bingo Card, catch the pop-up merry tales, and enjoy entertainments fit for a king! Friday 20th June at 7.30pm Show 1 -

Professor Liz Oakley-Brown returns to the pod to discuss the play Thersites (c.1537) attributed to Nicholas Udall and based on a dialogue by from Joannes Ravisius Textor - the play features a snail fight, and much more - part of our build up to our season of Henrician drama. This episode was recorded live on zoom on Tuesday 10th June at 7.15pm 2025. For more on the medieval manuscript side of things - over on BBC Sounds (where available) is Knight Fights Giant Snail. We reference Marie Axton's Three Tudor Classical Interludes which is the only modern edition of the play that we are aware of. We will be staging Thersites live on Sunday 22nd June 2025 at the Quay Theatre - tickets for the show are available here. But if that's not possible we have two exploring sessions online - a vanilla First Look, and a super charged Second Look. CW: We keep this fairly Universal, but towards the end we do discuss a death. Entertaining Henry is a co-production with The Quay Theatre and Beyond Shakespeare... Let us take you

It's time for some !Spoilers! for Act Two of Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe (discuss attribution with footnotes, please only write on one side of the paper at a time). The play was recorded at The White Bear Theatre on Tuesday 12th December 2023. If you’d like more on this play, there are exploring sessions galore on the YouTube. All our rehearsals, dress run, and rough live mix are on the patreon feed from £5 tier or above. The full cast audio adaptation edit of this will follow later in the year. The recording used throughout this episode is a live mix of the performed play – it’s clearer than the first rough mix and focuses on the text as writ. The final release will be cleaner and a more entertaining listen. Sojourner Hazelwood-Connell – Dido Kit McGuire – Aeneas Karim Kronfli - Iarbus Alex Kapila - Anna Pamela Flanagan - Ascanius Lynsey Beauchamp - Ilioneus Sarah Blake - Venus Keith Hill - Achates Alexandra Kataigida - Cloanthus Emma Kemp - Cupid Simon Nader - Sergestus T

As part of the run up to Entertaining Henry we have this chat about Thomas More, prompted by Dr Joanne Paul's latest book on his life - it's a Venn diagram of a discussion, between the life of More, and the theatre world around him. Recorded live on zoom - there will be another live discussion in under two weeks time, details below. Thomas More: A Life and Death in Tudor England by Dr Joanne Paul is coming to UK bookshops this week, and the US in a couple of months (I believe) - do support your local bookstore, or order from somewhere responsible like... https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/thomas-more-a-life-dr-joanne-paul/7765640?ean=9781405953603 For more on the plays of John Heywood and a little on John Rastell - here's a handy playlist. Next Discussing Live: Snail Fight! with Professor Liz Oakley-BrownEntertaining Henry is a co-production with The Quay Theatre and Beyond Shakespeare... Let us take you through a whistle-stop tour of the entertainment world from Henry’s reign: from his youthful days to his m

It's time for some !Spoilers! for Act One of Dido, Queen of Carthage by Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe (discuss, with footnotes, please only write on one side of the paper at a time). The play was recorded at The White Bear Theatre on Tuesday 12th December 2023. We know we said Robert would be doing briefer Spoilers episodes, but that clearly didn't happen... If you’d like more on this play, there are exploring sessions galore on the YouTube. All our rehearsals, dress run, and rough live mix are on the patreon feed from £5 tier or above. The full cast audio adaptation edit of this will follow later in the year. The recording used throughout this episode is a live mix of the performed play – it’s clearer than the first rough mix and focuses on the text as writ. The final release will be cleaner and a more entertaining listen. Kit McGuire – Aeneas Karim Kronfli - Iarbus Pamela Flanagan - Ascanius Lynsey Beauchamp - Ilioneus Sarah Blake - Venus Keith Hill - Jupiter / Achates Alexandra Kataigida - Cloanthu

Speech! Speech! Occasional scenes and speeches from plays, voted for by those you support our work. This is a speech from Edward II by Christopher Marlowe, recorded live at our Revels season on Tuesday 12th December 2023. With Pamela Flanagan as Isabella. Our patrons received the scene within this episode in January 2024 - 17 months early! The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi https://ko-fi.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you want to give us some feedback, email us at admin@beyondshakespeare.org, follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram @BeyondShakes or go to our website: https://beyondshakespeare.org You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel where (most of) our exploring sessions live - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLa4pXxGZFwTX4QSaB5XNdQ The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is hosted and produced by Robert Crighton. 

The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus, is the book that is the source for Christopher Marlowe's play. Chapter by chapter we will wander through the twists and turns of this story. Chapter Eighteen: A question put forth by Doctor Faustus to his Spirit, concerning Astronomy.   Our patrons also get an exploring session looking in detail at the text - join our chat here. Thunder sfx thanks to zapsplat.com Our patrons received this episode in April 2024 - approx. 13 months early. The Beyond Shakespeare Podcast is supported by its patrons – become a patron and you get to choose the plays we work on next. Go to www.patreon.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you'd like to buy us a coffee at ko-fi https://ko-fi.com/beyondshakespeare - or if you want to give us some feedback, email us at admin@beyondshakespeare.org, follow us on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram @BeyondShakes or go to our website: https://beyondshakespeare.org You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel where (most o