Episode 262. Talking About ‘Christmas’

Published by austin on December 12, 2011

“After every Thursday night performance, Merrimack Repertory Theatre invites the audience to stick around afterwards and talk to the actors or writers or directors. In the case of our performance of The Ultimate Christmas Show (abridged) last week, the audience got all three. Featuring information on costumes you’ll need to see to believe, sweeping generalizations, the value of tie-breakers, how to draw the line between offensive and hysterical, and our favorite and most moving ’12 Days of Christmas’ contribution. (Length 22:14)

Podcast: Download (20.5MB)

Subscribe: Spotify | RSS | More

Categories: Reduced Shakespeare Company Podcast

Tags: ActingBackstageChristmasDirectingInterviewJack BaldwinMerrimack Repertory TheatreWCAPWriting

4 Comments

Simone Germain · December 18, 2011 at 5:54 am

I saw the Christmas Show last night with my Son and my Mother….we laughed until our sides hurt! Great job guys!

Bill Minor · December 14, 2011 at 4:47 pm

Yeah haha tell me about it. Well I’ll be sure to bring myself to one of your performances the next time you roll into town.

austin · December 14, 2011 at 10:31 am

You’re welcome, Bill. Better get cracking’ though – you have five years of podcasts to catch up on!

Bill Minor · December 14, 2011 at 9:02 am

Just started listening to the podcast I love it. I was first exposed to the RSC last year when I had student directed Shakespeare Abridged at my high school. It was one of the greatest experiences of my life and I would like to thank you all for that.

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Michelle’s ‘Green World’

Michelle Ephraim – a Professor of English and (with Caroline Bicks), the cohost of the Everyday Shakespeare podcast and the co-author of Shakespeare, Not Stirred: Cocktails for Your Everyday Dramas – joins us this week to talk about her frank and funny new book, Green World: A Tragicomic Memoir of Love & Shakespeare. Michelle reveals she discovered Shakespeare surprisingly late; how “fun” is a a perfectly fine description of her sometimes fraught memoir; the shared curse of meeting hero Stephens; how Shakespeare became a source of both pain and solace in the wake of a parent’s death; how her relatively cushy job became surprisingly hazardous; and, finally, how Shakespeare – a dead European white man – became a very relatable force for inclusion. (Length 19:31)

Visiting ‘Shakespeare’s House’

Richard Schoch discusses Shakespeare’s House: A Window Onto His Life and Legacy, his wonderful new history of not only the building in Stratford-upon-Avon that William Shakespeare was born in, but how that building survived and became ground zero in the Shakespeare tourism industry. Schoch reveals how he discovered the dual focus of his book; how it took almost 200 years for people to realize the treasure that still stood in their midst; the shenanigans played by people who first depicted Shakespeare’s birthplace; the important distinctions between restoring a house and remaking it; the trick of hitting that sweet spot between writing an academic history and a popular one; and how the most important person in Shakespeare’s birthplace is not Shakespeare but the visitor. (Length 18:52)

All Our Yesterdays

Joel H. Morris discusses his debut novel All Our Yesterdays – no, not the penultimate episode of Star Trek: The Original Series – which tells the compellingly plausible story of the events that lead up to William Shakespeare's Macbeth. Morris reveals his multiple inspirations, both literary and personal; how investigations into the actual historical couple Shakespeare based his play on informed his novel; the ways in which writing is a process of discovery; how he balanced the political and the personal, the natural and supernatural; how he summoned the courage to explore one of literature's most famous characters; and the wonderful inability to let go of characters that won’t let you go. (Length 22:56)