This collection of essays by both theatre scholars and practitioners examines the political and aesthetic consequences of the marriage of Shakespearean text and realist performance style, considering productions ranging from the early twentieth century to 2016.

This collection of essays examines the works of the most famous writer of plays in the English language within the most culturally pervasive genre in which they are performed. Though Realist productions of Shakespeare are central to the ways in which his work is produced and consumed in the 21^st century-and has been for the last 100 years-scholars are divided on the socio-political, historical, and ethical effects of this marriage of content and style.

The book is divided into two sections, the first of which focuses on how Realist performance style influences our understanding of Shakespeare’s characters. These chapters engage in close readings of multiple performances, interrogating the ways in which actors’ specific characterizations contribute to extremely varied interpretations of a single character.

The second section then considers audiences’ experiences of Shakespearean texts in Realist performance. The essays in this section-all written by theatre directors-imagine out what might constitute Realism. Each chapter focuses on a particular production, or set of productions by a single company, and considers how the practitioners utilized critically informed notions of what constitutes “the real” to reframe what Realism looks like on stage.

This is a book of arguments by both theatre practitioners and scholars. Rather than presenting a unified critical position, this collection seeks to stimulate the debate around Realist Shakespeare performance, and to attend to the political consequences of particular aesthetic choices for the audience, as well as for Shakespeare critics and theatre artists.

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Josy Miller

Part 1Realism and Shakespearean Character

1The Trouble with Bertram: Experiencing Stanislavsky in All’s Well That Ends Well

Roberta Barker and Kim Solga

2Shakespearean Character at the Fin du Siecle

Peter Kanelos

3Violence and Consensual Imagination in A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Yu Jin Ko

Part 2Shakespearean Realism(s) and the Audience

4“Never, Never, Never, Never, Never”: On Shakespearean Realism and the Question of Empathy

Josy Miller

5Allo-Realism and Intensive-Extensive Shakespeares: Transversal Theater Company’s Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and Titus Andronicus

Sam Kolodezh & Bryan Reynolds

6Directing Realism

Peter Lichtenfels

Appendix A. Theatre, Now: A Midsummer Night’s Dream for Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center

Works Cited

Index

About the Contributors

About the Editors