Identity, power and journeys: new voices respond to Shakespeare's plays
The Royal Shakespeare Company have a wonderful exhibition at the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, The Play’s The Thing, with a regularly-changing selection of costumes and props, plus stories from behind the scenes. I’ve written for this exhibition from the time it launched in 2018, weaving together details from the objects, the plays and the performances.
Post-pandemic, the exhibition has had a new co-curated focus. In its most recent incarnation the displays include objects selected during workshops with Warwickshire Pride; the Fred Winter Centre (which supports people experiencing homelessness), and an activity group for young people and adults with additional needs called ILEAP. I went to the ILEAP workshop and saw the joyful process of staff and group members sparking off one another and the collections. As they selected, chatted, and shared stories and experiences, I gathered responses to use in the label-writing, which I then embarked upon for the full set of new exhibits.
Institutions are designed to wield power, not to share it, and it is therefore no simple thing to co-curate successfully. The benefits, however, can be stunningly apparent. The diversity of costumes, characters and actors chosen by the co-curators is refreshingly inclusive of body size, skin tone and gender identity. A pretty dress might equally be worn by Juliette Stevenson playing Titania in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as by Ryan Gage portraying Player Queen in Hamlet. As the Pride group said, queerness has always been here, and Gage’s sumptuous, stage-filling costume celebrates it.
Identity is one strong theme that emerged during the workshops. Details noticed by the groups opened up new perspectives on belonging: the red-painted jacket worn by Michael Abubakar in King John reminded one ILEAP member of the red lions on the England football team strip. He talked about his little brother’s love of football and all agreed they would like to wear this jacket.
Journeys were very significant to people in the Fred Winter Centre group. They chose Alex Kingston’s costume as Prospero in The Tempest, saying it told a hundred stories about battling storms, sleeping rough, finding resilience and strength despite tough times. ‘We are swimming and not sinking, all in the same sea but in different boats,’ one person said.
Shakespeare’s stories are ever-relevant and this project is uncovering fresh ways of reading them. Here are photos of some of the new exhibits and a few pieces of interpretation from the exhibition, which is free and open every day.
And below is a video I made of the exhibition in May 2023, exploring how the responses of local students, refugees and charity volunteers feature in the show.