Join Michael Shapiro, esteemed Shakespearean scholar, for a presentation on Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale including film clips from the Royal Shakespeare Company. From the Folger Shakespeare Library: The Winter’s Tale, one of Shakespeare’s very late plays, is filled with improbabilities. Before the conclusion, one character comments that what we are about to see, “Were it but told you, should be hooted at / Like an old tale.” It includes murderous passions, man-eating bears, princes and princesses in disguise, death by drowning and by grief, oracles, betrayal, and unexpected joy. Yet the play, which draws much of its power from Greek myth, is grounded in the everyday. 

For the presentation Michael recommends that you watch The Royal Shakespeare Company production from 1999 starring Antony Sher as Leontes who The Times characterized as “a smiling monster with glinting eyes.” - Benedict Nightingale, The Times, 10 April 1999.

Rent: The Winter’s Tale on Amazon: Rent "A Winter's Tale" for $2.99 on Amazon

Date: Thursday, November 30, 2023

Time: 6:30 p.m. Central, 7:30PM Eastern, 4:30PM Pacific

Location: Zoom Video Conference

Cost: Free