featuring interviews with actor Mark Quartley
and Keene State College professor Brinda Charry

Episode 10 delves into the first non-human character featured on the podcast: Ariel, the sprite who serves Prospero in one of Shakespeare’s final plays, his swan song, The Tempest. Dr. Brinda Charry — an English professor at Keene State College — and Mark Quartley — currently playing Ariel for the Royal Shakespeare Company — discuss Ariel’s complicated relationship with his master, varying interpretations of the moment he is set free, how an actor crafts the physicality of a spirit made of air, and how Ariel discovers what it is to be human. Quartley also talks about his unique experience playing Ariel via real-time motion-capture technology in this stage production running at the Barbican Theatre in London through August 18th. The RSC's Tempest is produced in collaboration with Intel and in association with The Imaginarium Studios. Quartley co-stars opposite Simon Russell Beale, returning to the RSC as Prospero after having taken on the role of Ariel in 1993.

Listen on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play Music, or in the audio player above.