It’s spring! Time for fun! Time to be outside! Time to play sports! Time to enjoy flowers and birds! Time for picnics! Time for Shakespeare!

Wait…what? Shakespeare fun? Isn’t Shakespeare serious and impossible to understand and boring and old, and irrelevant, and pretty much the opposite of fun?

In a word: no. Shakespeare can be boring and old and serious and irrelevant, but it doesn’t need to be. In fact, Shakespeare started out as a guy who moved to London to pursue the career he wanted, which was to dress up and act and write stories that appealed to all kinds of people and make money by creating popular entertainment. His plays were full of naughty jokes and silly characters and recognizable family drama and challenges to authority. The people watching the plays were eating and drinking while they watched, and even threw a bit of food at the actors if things got a bit dull.

Shakespeare shook things up in the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I. Joined by fellow playwrights and actors, Shakespeare made English theatre a vibrant part of London life. Despite the plague closing the theatres for months at a time and cynical censors who didn’t want anyone questioning authority, Shakespeare created worlds out of words that are fun and tragic and controversial and full of family and friends and enemies and armies.

We are ready to shake up spring with Shakespeare.

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