SF Shakes talks Shakespeare On Tour’s 2023 production “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” with Director Sydney Schwindt.
Sydney is a Resident Artist with SF Shakes and an actor, fight director, teaching artist, and visual artist. She is also a visiting professor of movement (specializing in Commedia and Clown) at Indiana University and the former stage combat instructor for the graduate program at American Conservatory Theater. Along with bringing her experience of physical […]
SF Shakes Chats With Pericles Himself, Ron Chapman
Ron Chapman plays the titular role of Pericles in Free Shakespeare at Home and in the Park, 2021. Last year, he played Edmund in SF Shakes’ virtual production of King Lear, his first ever Shakespeare play. We Zoomed with Ron to talk about his return to the virtual stage, which happens to be the only […]
SF Shakes Chats with Carla Pantoja, Director of Vision for Free Shakespeare in the Park: Pericles Prince of Tyre, Summer 2021
This summer, SF Shakes will perform Pericles, Prince of Tyre. Last summer’s production was broadcast live and online due to the pandemic. This year’s selection, however, will be an experiment in hybridity and structure as the Bay Area gradually enters a post-pandemic era. The play will be performed live in 4 episodes released serially over […]
The Beat Goes On: Shakespeare’s Heartbeat Program for Students on the Autism Spectrum Finds a Home at Francisco Middle School
SF Shakes talks with Natalia Ceniseroz, AKA “Ms. C.” about the impact of Shakespeare’s Heartbeat in her Francisco Middle School classroom Last year San Francisco Shakespeare Festival embraced the Hunter Heartbeat Method by piloting Shakespeare’s Heartbeat, a classroom curriculum for students on the autism spectrum. This experiment in theater education for neurodiverse kids was overseen […]
Too Cool for Zoom? Why your kids might love SF Shakes’ virtual Shakespeare programs. In conversation with Teaching Artist Amy Lizardo.
When the pandemic hit a year ago, SF Shakes pivoted rapidly to online platforms for the safety of audiences, artists, and staff. Not only did Free Shakespeare in the Park become a trailblazing live virtual experience, but education programs also shifted to the virtual sphere. Our initial pivot is chronicled in this blog; you can […]
Queer Voices from the Balcony: a new diverse and inclusive resource for teachers of Romeo and Juliet
It is very easy to forget that a boy actor played Juliet on Shakespeare’s stage in large part because the modern film history of Romeo and Juliet has been relentlessly heterosexual. Moreover, these film versions are often instrumental in the teaching of this popular tragedy in middle and high school. Gen Xers may recall the […]
Bayview Eateries
SF Shakes Office HQ is located in the Bayview Neighborhood of San Francisco. We’re shining a light on our independent neighborhood eateries during the San Francisco run of Free Shakespeare at Home: King Lear. If you live in the City, please consider supporting these small businesses so they can be around long after this pandemic […]
A Peek Behind the (Virtual) Curtain of King Lear
Ever since we announced that SF Shakes would move forward with a virtual production of King Lear, there have been quite a few questions about how exactly a live-streamed, virtual production would work. Well, today, your resident nerdy literary interns will endeavor to explain as best we can, starting with a creative dramatization of the process. […]
King Lear: Synopsis
A Kingdom Divided Upon her retirement, King Lear decides to divide the kingdom among her daughters so that she might “unburdened crawl towards death.” Lear makes her daughters earn their inheritance by performing declarations of flattery. Cunning Goneril and Regan play along, win their portions, and are married off to the Dukes of Albany and […]
Voice of America: “For California Theater Producers,The Show Must Go On, Even During Pandemic”
This is a video story on the state of live theater in California. It features Elizabeth Carter, Director of Free Shakespeare @ Home, King Lear. https://www.voanews.com/episode/california-theater-producers-show-must-go-even-during-pandemic-4341861