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International academic arenas: shaping Shakespeare and his contemporaries at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse and the Blackfriars Playhouse

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posted on 2024-03-18, 16:41 authored by Michelle Leonforte

This thesis examines the interrelationship between two indoor reconstructed theatres: the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse in London, UK and the Blackfriars Playhouse in Virginia, USA. It is divided into two sections: the history of the sites and their genesis figures – Sam Wanamaker and Ralph Alan Cohen and how the spaces function today as academic arenas and performance venues. I critique how the sites continue to shape and reshape their image through the marketing of their productions and the wider discourses and practices surrounding the spaces themselves.

The final chapter examines the playhouses’ responses to Covid-19, and the pandemic’s impact on their theatrical and educational output. Previous scholarship on the sites focuses on them in isolation and is traditionally carried out by affiliated scholars. Using a performance studies framework, I analyse the academic and professional dialogue between the sites, its origins, and the impact it has on the continued development of the institutions.

The study is supported by a mixture of archival research, interviews, and performance critique. I identify a trio of frictions between the artistic, the academic and the commercial and discuss the way these tensions continue to construct and develop two successful institutions driven by reconstruction. I argue that examining the theatres together enables a greater understanding of their continuing contributions to reconstructed theatre and performance.

History

Institution

Anglia Ruskin University

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  • Published version

Thesis name

  • PhD

Thesis type

  • Doctoral

Thesis submission date

2024-02-13

Legacy Faculty/School/Department

Faculty of Art, Humanities and Social Sciences

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