The Archaeology of Performance Spaces

Guest Speaker: Professor Martin White (Bristol)
Chair: Professor Michael Cordner (York)

PROGRAMME

3 - 4pm Dr Kate Giles (York) "The Guild Buildings of Shakespeare's Stratford" and Ollie Jones (York) "Bastards, Brawls and Broken Benches: The Queen's Men at Stratford-upon-Avon"
4pm TEA
4.30-6pm Professor Martin White (Bristol) "Recovering the Indoor Jacobean Playhouse"

Martin White

Martin White is Foundation Chair of Drama and Professor of Theatre at the University of Bristol.

His research focuses on the plays and theatre practices of the early modern professional playhouses, and the performances of these plays on the modern stage. From 2000-2007 Martin was responsible for steering the London Globe’s research programme and he continues to advise them on the development of the indoor playhouse that will stand alongside the Globe reconstruction. He was the Season Consultant for the RSC’s 2002 and 2005 seasons of less well-known Elizabethan and Jacobean plays at the Swan in Stratford upon Avon.

Martin White’s publications include an edition of Arden of Faversham in the New Mermaids series (1982, reprinted six times); Middleton and Tourneur (1992); Renaissance Drama in Action (1998), essays and book chapters including ‘William Poel’s Globe’ (Theatre Notebook, 1999); Mark Rylance at the Globe in Extraordinary Actors (2004); ‘London Professional Playhouses and Performances’ in the new Cambridge History of British Theatre (2004), ‘Trevor Nunn’ in Directors' Shakespeare (2008); and on research practices at the new Globe in Shakespeare's Globe: A Theatrical Experiment (2008); an edition of Massinger’s The Roman Actor for the Revels series (2007); and his book on A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2009). Martin White’s AHRC-funded interactive DVD on early modern performance practices, The Chamber of Demonstrations is now widely available (see chamberofdemonstrations.com for full details). Martin has directed more than fifty stage productions, many as research in practice into early modern drama.

Recent work includes a chapter on Sir Antony Sher for Actors' Shakespeare (due 2011) and entries for the forthcoming encyclopedias of early modern drama to be published next year by Greenwood Press and Blackwells. At present Martin is working on a book-length study of John Ford's 'Tis Pity She's A Whore (due 2011) and preparing an edition of Jonson's Bartholomew Fair for the Revels plays (due 2013). A longer-term project is a book, currently titled Rough Magic, exploring the arts of performance in the early modern period.

Contact Bill Sherman (bill.sherman@york.ac.uk)