English and Related Literature
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- The Life of the Playhouse
The Life of the Playhouse
This education pack adapts recent academic research into the Georgian playhouse to showcase this lively theatrical setting to today's pupils.
Led by Dr Chloe Wigston Smith, in collaboration with Richmond's Georgian Theatre Royal, this education pack brings theatre history to life by inviting pupils to imagine what audiences saw and heard in the Georgian playhouse.
Education pack
Our comprehensive pack is available to all, and includes free lesson plans and activities ranging from 10 to 30 minutes that can be applied directly in the classroom.
, 1,560kb)Contact us
If you have any questions, get in touch with Chloe at: chloe.wigstonsmith@york.ac.uk
Why the Life of the Playhouse?
A play is more than the lines of dialogue printed on a page. It's also about the experience of attending the theatre. The Georgian playhouse was a particularly lively and raucous social scene, where no one sat quietly in their place. Audience members expressed their responses to actors and productions during the play, and ate, drank and socialised in their seats. This education pack invites pupils to step back in time to a moment in history where theatre-going was a major social activity, a place to be seen and see others.A range of activities helps pupils to see and hear the past by focusing attention on the sights and sounds of the Georgian stage - with an eye to thinking about key differences between theatre-going, then and now. Pupils will develop insights into what these differences show about the Georgian views of leisure time, class and stage innovations.