Your guide to streaming Shakespeare in June

In addition to Shakespeare films on Amazon, HBO, and others, and streaming performances from the National Theatre, Shakespeare’s Globe, and Stratford Festival, many of the Folger’s theater partners are creating great programming that you can watch online. Keep reading to find performances, conversations, classes, and podcasts available online in June.

What are you watching this month? Tell us in the comments!

Alabama Shakespeare Festival’s Play On! resources include short streaming plays, virtual workshops, coloring pages, and a Zoom happy hour with Artistic Director Rick Dildine.

American Players Theatre’s Out of the Woods reading series begins this month.

American Players Theatre’s Out of the Woods reading series begins this month. Starting June 12, the theater will make new readings available every Friday at 7 pm CT on PBS Wisconsin’s website. June feature one acts by Chekhov (June 12), As You Like It (June 19), and Shaw’s Arms and the Man (June 26). July kicks off with Julius Caesar (July 3), followed by Carlyle Brown’s Are You Now Or Have You Ever Been (July 10).

Brave Spirits Theatre spent the month of May exploring the history play genre in a series of live online readings of plays by Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Now, you can watch recordings of seven readings, featuring the works of Shakespeare, Marlowe, Peele, and the ever-popular “Unknown” on their YouTube page. Keep an eye out for a new upcoming date for their live reading of John Ford’s Perkin Warbeck.

Chesapeake Shakespeare Company’s Founding Artistic Director Ian Gallinar hosts Past is Prologue, a series of interviews with actors, educators, and others, on the company’s YouTube page.

Check out new resources from the Chicago Shakespeare Theater on their SHAKES@HOME page, including their new podcast, ASIDES.

Classical Theatre of Harlem’s new Behind the Curtain series explores what it takes to make a play:

See digital programs from Colorado Shakespeare Festival on CU Presents Digital.

Actors from Commonwealth Shakespeare Company’s annual Shakespeare on the Common performances are sharing some of their favorite speeches from past seasons with the company’s Shakespeare on the Common Encores series. You can also strap on your VR goggles and check out Thy Father’s Spirit, the company’s groundbreaking virtual reality production of Hamlet.

⇒Related: Listen to our interview with Commonwealth Shakespeare Company Artistic Director Steve Maler and cinematographer Matthew Niederhauser about creating Thy Father’s Spirit.

Don’t miss upcoming live readings of The Merchant of Venice and A Midsummer Night’s Dream from the Florida Shakespeare Theater on the company’s Facebook page.

Folger Theatre and Two River Theatre’s “Macbeth,” with Kate Eastwood Norris, is streaming for free through July 1. Photo: T. Charles Erickson.

Folger Theatre and Two River Theater’s Macbeth is extending! We’re keeping the film of our 2008 production, co-directed by Teller of Penn & Teller and Aaron Posner, up on YouTube beyond its original July 1 end date. “If you think that Shakespearean tragedy is stuffy fare fit only for snooty eggheads,” Wall Street Journal critic Terry Teachout writes of the film, “this “Macbeth” will change your mind.”

Learn a little bit about magic, hiking, crocheting, and, of course, Shakespeare from Gamut Theatre Group’s Learn Something New series.

Check out study guides, scholarly conversations, and sonnets on Nebraska Shakespeare’s website.

Enjoy new streaming content on the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s O! platform, including a free audio book version of the festival’s 2018 production of Othello and a new episode of their Why Shakespeare? series

On June 18 at 7:30 PDT, tune in to a live, online reading of Twelfth Night from Seattle Shakespeare. The reading, part of their Ruff Reads series, will reunite the cast of their 2012 production of the play.

Find panel discussions on Shakespeare in prison on Shakespeare at Notre Dame’s website.

Learn more about Shakespeare in prisons from Shakespeare at Notre Dame. The company is making panel discussions on the topic available on their website: each discussion will be hosted on YouTube, and will be followed by a Live Community Q&A session conducted via Zoom. Watch the first discussion, “Advocacy in a Brave New World,” now, and tune into the Q&A on June 8 at 5 pm EDT. This October, Shakespeare at Notre Dame will partner with the Folger Institute to virtually produce the 4th international Shakespeare in Prisons Conference. Registration for the virtual conference opens August 3.

Shakespeare Dallas’s Will on the Go program features online lessons on six of Shakespeare’s plays for students in 2nd – 12th grade.

Watch a host of digital Shakespeare performances and discussions with St. Louis Shakespeare Festival’s Shakespeare TV.

On Shakespeare in Detroit’s new Power 15 podcast, Founding Executive Director Sam White chats about Shakespeare with playwright Emilio Rodriguez, producer Ron Simon, author Margaret Atwood, and others.

Watch the Southwest Shakespeare Company’s reading of The Merchant of Venice on the company’s Facebook page.

Southwest Shakespeare Company’s May virtual reading of The Merchant of Venice is available on Facebook, with Patrick Page as Antonio and Zach Appelman as Bassanio.

The Old Globe has a ton of online resources available on their website. New this month: The Living Room Play Workshop will help you write, develop, design, direct, and present your own “Living Room”-inspired short play. Check it out on The Old Globe’s Arts Engagement Facebook page.

Watch a recording of Theatre for a New Audience’s virtual conversation with Shakespeareans James Shapiro, Emma Smith, and Scott Newstok.

Alabama Shakespeare Festival, American Players Theatre, Brave Spirits Theatre, Chesapeake Shakespeare Company, Chicago Shakespeare Company, Classical Theatre of Harlem, Colorado Shakespeare Festival, Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, Florida Shakespeare Theater, Gamut Theatre Group, Nebraska Shakespeare, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Seattle Shakespeare, Shakespeare at Notre Dame, Shakespeare Dallas, St. Louis Shakespeare Festival, Shakespeare in Detroit, Southwest Shakespeare Company, The Old Globe, and Theatre for a New Audience are members of the Folger’s Shakespeare Theater Partnership Program.