Where to See a Performance
The Hilberry Theatre at Night
Photo Credit Unknown
- Hilberry Theatre CompanyThe Hilberry Theatre is unique. It is the nation’s first and only graduate repertory theatre company, charged with presenting six classic and modern plays in rotating repertory from September to mid-May.
- Stratford FestivalWith William Shakespeare as its foundation, the Stratford Festival aims to set the standard for classical theatre in North America.
- Shakespeare in DetroitShakespeare in Detroit provides approachable Shakespeare to the city's residents, Michganders and aims to entice audiences all over the nation and world to come to Detroit and experience the Bard's work.
- Water Works Theatre Company - Shakespeare Royal OakSince 2001, Water Works Theatre Company has offered the wonderful work of the Bard with Michigan’s best professional and emerging professional artists, in a one-of-a-kind outdoor summer setting. In 2002, Water Works also began to fill an educational niche by offering professional Shakespeare performance training to K through 8th grade students.
- Michigan Shakespeare FestivalAs the Official Shakespeare Festival of the State of Michigan, the Michigan Shakespeare Festival is a professional Equity theatre company (LOA/LORT) dedicated to producing world-class classical plays. Now in preparation for our 21st year, we perform in Jackson's lovely Baughman Theatre, and for the first time this year, we are expanding to Canton's beautiful Village Theatre of Cherry Hill.
Performances Online
- Shakespeare Plays & Poems on Recordings (Spotify)A 68 Hour Playlist of Shakespeare’s Plays Being Performed by Great Actors gathered on one playlist by Ulysses' Classical on Spotify.*
- Shakespeare - Performances on YouTubeOver 100,000 performances and related recordings freely available online.
The Globe Theatre
Claes Jansz Visscher, “Globe Theater,”
Londinum florentissima Brittaniae urbs, 1626.
By permission of the Folger Shakespeare Library
"During the first years of Elizabeth’s reign, the English playing companies used inns, inn yards, college halls and private houses for their performances. It was not until 1576 that the actor-manager James Burbage built the Theatre in Shoreditch, the first purpose-built playhouse in London. Shakespeare joined the resident troupe at the Theatre in the 1580s and the company (later known as the Chamberlain’s and then the King’s Men) flourished there for 20 years.
In 1596 a dispute arose over the renewal of the lease and negotiations were begun to acquire a disused hall in the precincts of the old Blackfriars priory to use as an indoor theatre. James Burbage died in February 1597; in April the lease expired, but the dispute continued for two years, during which time the company performed at the nearby Curtain playhouse. In Christmas 1598 the company sought a drastic solution: they leased a plot near the Rose, a rival theatre in Southwark, demolished the Theatre and carried its timbers over the river. To cover the cost of the new playhouse, James Burbage’s sons Cuthbert and Richard, offered some members of the company shares in the building. Shakespeare was one of four actors who bought a share in the Globe. By early 1599 the theatre was up and running and for 14 years it thrived, presenting many of Shakespeare’s greatest plays.
In 1613, during a performance of Henry VIII, wadding from a stage cannon ignited the thatched roof and the theatre burned to the ground ‘all in less than two hours, the people having enough to do to save themselves’. The theatre was quickly rebuilt, this time with a tiled roof. Shakespeare may have acted in the second Globe, but he probably never wrote for it. It remained the home for Shakespeare’s old company until the closure of all the theatres under England’s Puritan administration in 1642. No longer of use, it was demolished to make room for tenements in 1644."
-Shakespeare's Globe
- Shakespeare's GlobeThe Globe stands a few hundred yards from its original site. The rebuilding of the iconic building stems from the founding of the Shakespeare's Globe Trust by the American actor and director Sam Wanamaker.