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Holiday Hours: The Folger is closing at 4:30pm on Dec 24 and Dec 31. We are closed all day on Dec 25 and Jan 1.

Podcasts and recordings /

Shakespeare Unlimited

Full Episode List

Episode 250: Directing Romeo and Juliet, with Sam Gold

Episode 249: The Tragedy of Richard II and Henry IV, with Helen Castor

Episode 248: Studying Shakespeare Now

Episode 247: How Shakespeare Revolutionized Tragedy, with Rhodri Lewis

Episode 246: Tabitha Stanmore on Practical Magic in Shakespeare’s England

Episode 245: Will Tosh on the Hidden Queer Lives of William Shakespeare

Episode 244: Throughlines, with Ayanna Thompson and Ruben Espinosa

Episode 243:  Juliet, Then and Now, with Sophie Duncan

Episode 242: Completing the Canon: Barry Edelstein on The Old Globe’s Henry 6

Episode 241: Colman Domingo on Sing Sing and the Power of Theater

Episode 240: The Brief Life and Big Impact of the Federal Theatre Project, with James Shapiro

Episode 239: A Tour of the Newly-Reopened Folger | Part 2: Research at the Folger

Episode 238: A Tour of the Newly-Reopened Folger | Part 1

Episode 237: Fred Wilson on His New Work for the Folger

Episode 236: Second Chances, Shakespeare, and Freud, with Adam Phillips and Stephen Greenblatt

Episode 235: Mary Zimmerman on Adapting Ovid and Directing Shakespeare

Episode 234: Dame Judi Dench on Seven Decades of Shakespeare, with Brendan O’Hea

Episode 233: Shakespeare and the Environment, with Todd Andrew Borlik

Episode 232: Ramie Targoff on Shakespeare’s Sisters: Women Writers of the English Renaissance

Episode 231: Green World: Michelle Ephraim on Discovering Shakespeare and Reevaluating The Merchant of Venice

Episode 230: Eddie Izzard on Performing Hamlet Solo

Episode 229: Shakespeare and Disgust, with Bradley J. Irish

Episode 228: Rita Dove on Shakespeare and Her Poem of Welcome for the Folger

Episode 227: Julia Fox and John Guy on Their Biography of Anne Boleyn

Episode 226: David and Ben Crystal Share Shakespeare Quotes for Everyday Life

Episode 225: What Happened to the Princes in the Tower, with Philippa Langley

Episode 224: Will Somer: Peter Andersson on Henry VIII’s Court Fool

Episode 223: Isabelle Schuler’s Queen Hereafter Imagines Lady Macbeth’s Backstory

Episode 222: 400 Years of Shakespeare’s First Folio, with Emma Smith

Episode 221: Shakespeare and the Bloomsbury Group, with Marjorie Garber

Episode 220: Patrick Stewart on a Life Shaped by Shakespeare

Episode 219: Michael Patrick Thornton on Learning to Breather Again with Shakespeare

Episode 218: The Many Lives of John Donne, with Katherine Rundell

Episode 217: Shakespeare and the Ocean, with Steve Mentz

Episode 216: Farah Karim-Cooper on The Great White Bard

Episode 215: Isabella Hammad on Enter Ghost

Episode 214: Mat Osman’s The Ghost Theatre Imagines the Lives of Elizabethan London’s Child Actors

Episode 213: Adrian Lester on Playing Rosalind, Henry V, Othello, and Hamlet

Episode 212: Greg Doran on Forty Years of Directing Shakespeare

Episode 211: David West Read on & Juliet

Episode 210: Robert O’Hara on Directing Richard III

Episode 209: Publishing Shakespeare’s First Folio, with Chris Laoutaris

Episode 208: Lolita Chakrabarti on Adapting Hamnet for the Stage

Episode 207: James Ijames on Fat Ham

Episode 206: Marion Turner on The Wife of Bath: A Biography

Episode 205: Patrick Page on King Lear and Shakespeare’s Villains

Episode 204: Artificial Intelligence Goes to English Class, with Jennifer Black, John Ladd, and Laura Turchi

Episode 203: Margo Hendricks on Shakespeare, Race, and Romance

Episode 202: Lucy Wooding on Tudor England: A History

Episode 201: Debra Ann Byrd on Becoming Othello: A Black Girl’s Journey

Episode 200: Ian Smith on Black Shakespeare

Episode 199: Talene Monahon on Her New Revenge Comedy, Jane Anger

Episode 198: Fiona Ritchie on Sarah Siddons and John Philip Kemble

Episode 197: Billy Collins on Writing Short Poems and Approaching Shakespeare’s Sonnets

Episode 196: Adrian Noble on How to Direct Shakespeare

Episode 195: Ian McKellen on Richard III, Macbeth, and Gandalf

Episode 194: Ian McKellen on Playing Hamlet

Episode 193: How Shakespeare Thought About the Mind, with Helen Hackett

Episode 192: John Adams Gives Antony and Cleopatra the Operatic Treatment 

Episode 191: Brett Dean and Matthew Jocelyn on Their Hamlet Opera

Episode 190: Shakespeare and Ukraine, with Irena Makaryk

Episode 189: Leonard Barkan on Reading Shakespeare Reading Me

Episode 188: Pamela Hutchinson on Asta Nielsen’s Hamlet

Episode 187: How the Commedia Dell’Arte’s Actresses Changed the Shakespearean Stage, with Pamela Allen Brown

Episode 186: Matías Piñeiro on His Shakespeare-Adjacent Films

Episode 185: Molly Yarn on Shakespeare’s ‘Lady Editors’

Episode 184: Stephen Marche on How Shakespeare Changed Everything

Episode 183: Black Women Shakespeareans, 1821 – 1960, with Joyce Green MacDonald

Episode 182: Cutting Plays for Performance, with Aili Huber

Episode 181: J.R. Thorp on Learwife

Episode 180: Lena Cowen Orlin on The Private Life of William Shakespeare

Episode 179: Holidays in Shakespeare’s England, with Erika T. Lin

Episode 178: Bringing Latinx Voices to Shakespeare, with Cynthia Santos DeCure and Micha Espinosa

Episode 177: Shakespeare’s Language and Race, with Patricia Akhimie and Carol Mejia LaPerle

Episode 176: Shakespeare in Latinx Communities, with José Cruz González and David Lozano

Episode 175: Shakespeare and the British Royal Family, with Gordon McMullan

Episode 174: Mike Lew on Teenage Dick

Episode 173: Mona Awad on All’s Well

Episode 172: How We Hear Shakespeare’s Plays, with Carla Della Gatta

Episode 171: Richard Schoch on the Restoration Reinvention of Shakespeare

Episode 170: Madeline Sayet on Where We Belong

Episode 169: Geoffrey Marsh on Shakespeare’s Neighbors

Episode 168: Ambereen Dadabhoy on Race and Blackness in Elizabethan England

Episode 167: Paul Edmondson, All the Sonnets of Shakespeare

Episode 166: Richard III in Prison

Episode 165: Simon Godwin on Romeo & Juliet

Episode 164: David McInnis, Shakespeare and Lost Plays

Episode 163: Stephen Hopkins and Stephano

Episode 162: Meme García on house of sueños

Episode 161: Shakespeare in the Harlem Renaissance

Episode 160: Naomi Miller on Mary Sidney and Imperfect Alchemist

Episode 159: Shakespeare and Game of Thrones, with Jeffrey R. Wilson

Episode 158: Shakespeare, Science, and Art

Episode 157: Fat Rascals: In the Kitchen with John Tufts

Episode 156: The Victorian Cult of Shakespeare

Episode 155: Black Lives Matter in Titus Andronicus

Episode 154: The Show Must Go Online

Episode 153: Writing About the Plague in Shakespeare’s England

Episode 152: Lady Romeo

Episode 151: Richard II on the Radio

Episode 150: Maggie O’Farrell on Hamnet

Episode 149: Directing Shakespeare

Episode 148: The Booksellers 

Episode 147: Lucy Munro on The King’s Men 

Episode 146: Jonathan Bate on the Classics and Shakespeare

Episode 145: Sandra Newman on The Heavens

Episode 144: Kathryn Harkup on Death by Shakespeare

Episode 143: Shakespeare and Solace

Episode 142: The Long Life of Shakespeare’s Sonnets (18th century – today)

Episode 141: Emma Smith on This Is Shakespeare

Episode 140: James Shapiro on Shakespeare in a Divided America

Episode 139: Abraham Lincoln and Shakespeare

Episode 138: Shakespeare and Folktales

Episode 137: Books and Reading in Shakespeare’s England

Episode 136: The Early Years of Shakespeare’s Sonnets (16th and 17th centuries)

Episode 135: The History of Shakespeare in American Schools

Episode 134: Peter Brook 

Episode 133: Kenny Leon on Much Ado About Nothing

Episode 132: Women Performers in Shakespeare’s Time

Episode 131: Pericles and Mark Haddon’s The Porpoise

Episode 130: Shakespeare in Immigrant New York

Episode 129: Milton’s Copy of Shakespeare

Episode 128: Iqbal Khan

Episode 127: Shakespeare and Opera

Episode 126: If Shakespeare Wrote Mean Girls

Episode 125: Andrew McConnell Stott on the Shakespeare Jubilee

Episode 124: Lisa Klein on Ophelia 

Episode 123: Casey Wilder Mott and Fran Kranz on their LA Midsummer

Episode 122: The Gender Politics of Kiss Me, Kate

Episode 121: Glenda Jackson

Episode 120: Michael Kahn

Episode 119: Hamlet 360: Virtual Reality Shakespeare

Episode 118: Harriet Walter

Episode 117: Deborah Harkness on A Discovery of Witches

Episode 116: Acting, Emotion, and Science on Shakespeare’s Stage

Episode 115: Simon Mayo on Mad Blood Stirring

Episode 114: The Actor and the Assassin: Edwin and John Wilkes Booth

Episode 113: Olivia Hussey on Her Memoir, The Girl on the Balcony

Episode 112: Duke Ellington, Shakespeare, and Such Sweet Thunder 

Episode 111: The ABCs of Performing Hamlet

Episode 110: Pop Culture Shakespeare with Stefanie Jochman

Episode 109: Julie Schumacher on The Shakespeare Requirement

Episode 108: How to Behave Badly in Elizabethan England

Episode 107: Shakespeare Uncovered

Episode 106: Understanding Peter Sellars

Episode 105: Imagining Shakespeare’s Wife 

Episode 104: Steven Berkoff: Shakespeare’s Heroes and Villains

Episode 103: Kenneth Turan: Joe Papp and Shakespeare in the Park

Episode 102: Still Dreaming: Shakespeare with Seniors 

Episode 101: Elizabeth Norton: The Hidden Lives of Tudor Women

Episode 100: Stephen Greenblatt on Shakespeare’s Tyrants

Episode 99: Antioch Shakespeare Festival: John Lithgow, Robin Lithgow, and Tony Dallas

Episode 98: Paterson Joseph: Julius Caesar and Me

Episode 97: Stephen Alford: London’s Triumph

Episode 96: Astor Place Riot

Episode 95: How Shakespeare Changed My Life 

Episode 94: Antony Sher

Episode 93: Dennis McCarthy and June Schlueter on the George North Manuscript

Episode 92: Derek Jacobi: Acting Shakespeare

Episode 91: Derek Jacobi: Playing Hamlet

Episode 90: Bernard Cornwell on Fools and Mortals 

Episode 89: Orson Welles and Shakespeare

Episode 88: Marketing Shakespeare

Episode 87: Sights, Sounds, and Smells of Elizabethan Theater

Episode 86: Tang Xianzu and Shakespeare in China

Episode 85: Shakespeare and Science Fiction

Episode 84: Edward St. Aubyn on Dunbar

Episode 83: Shakespeare in Swahililand

Episode 82: Barry Edelstein: Thinking Shakespeare

Episode 81: Shakespeare and War

Episode 80: Leonard Bernstein and West Side Story

Episode 79: Shakespeare’s Kitchen

Episode 78: Akala and Hip-Hop Shakespeare

Episode 77: Creating TNT’s Will

Episode 76: Phyllida Lloyd and All-Female Shakespeare

Episode 75: The Royal Shakespeare Company’s Digital Tempest 

Episode 74: Tracy Chevalier

Episode 73: The Globe to Globe Hamlet Tour

Episode 72: Adapting Shakespeare

Episode 71: Shakespeare 400 Chicago

Episode 70:  Lauren Gunderson on The Book of Will 

Episode 69: How King Lear Inspired Empire

Episode 68: Something Rotten

Episode 67: Shakespeare and Marlowe 

Episode 66: Juliet’s Answer

Episode 65: Shakespeare in California

Episode 64: Q Brothers

Episode 63: Uncovering Shakespeare’s House

Episode 62: Shakespeare and YA Novels

Episode 61: Stephen Greenblatt on Shakespeare’s Life Stories 

Episode 60: Shakespeare and Girlhood

Episode 59: Shakespeare in Sign Language

Episode 58: Shakespeare in Solitary

Episode 57: Anecdotal Shakespeare

Episode 56: How Shakespeare’s First Folio Became a Star

Episode 55: Elizabethan Medicine

Episode 54: American Moor

Episode 53: The Food of Shakespeare’s World

Episode 52: Recreating the Boydell Gallery

Episode 51: Worlds Elsewhere

Episode 50: Othello and Blackface

Episode 49: Shakespeare and Religion

Episode 48: Shakespeare in Africa 

Episode 47: Creating Shakespeare’s First Folio

Episode 46: Kill Shakespeare Comics

Episode 45: Reduced Shakespeare Company

Episode 44: Inside the Folger Conservation Lab

Episode 43: Shakespeare and Magic

Episode 42: Shakespeare and World Cinema 

Episode 41: Pop Sonnets

Episode 40: Shakespeare in India

Episode 39: Auditioning for Shakespeare

Episode 38: Portraits of Shakespeare

Episode 37: William Shakespeare’s Star Wars

Episode 36: The Millionaire and the Bard

Episode 35: Shakespeare in the Caribbean

Episode 34: Great Shakespeare Actors

Episode 33: Music for Shakespeare’s Lyrics

Episode 32: The Year of Lear

Episode 31: Editing Shakespeare

Episode 30: Shakespeare Not Stirred

Episode 29: Great Shakespeareans

Episode 28: Shakespeare and The Tabard Inn

Episode 27: Shakespeare in Hong Kong

Episode 26: Shakespeare on Film

Episode 25: Shakespeare’s France and Italy

Episode 24: Elizabethan Street Fighting

Episode 23: Myths About Shakespeare

Episode 22: Recounting Shakespeare’s Life

Episode 21: Designing Shakespeare

Episode 20: African Americans and Shakespeare

Episode 19: Shakespeare in Black and White

Episode 18: Rarely Performed Shakespeare

Episode 17: A New First Folio Discovery

Episode 16: Pronouncing English as Shakespeare Did 

Episode 15: The Shakespearean Moons of Uranus 

Episode 14: Codes and Ciphers from the Renaissance to Today

Episode 13: When Romeo Was a Woman

Episode 12: Romeo and Juliet through the Ages

Episode 11: Music in Shakespeare

Episode 10: Artistic Directors Talk Shakespeare

Episode 9: Shakespeare and Insane Asylums

Episode 8: Why Shakespeare’s Stories Still Resonate

Episode 7: Shakespeare LOL

Episode 6: Shakespeare in Translation 

Episode 5: Punk Rock Shakespeare

Episode 4: Shakespeare Outdoors

Episode 3: In Search of the Real Richard III

Episode 2: Actresses on Shakespeare

Episode 1: The Robben Island Shakespeare