

The Rose Playhouse
The Rose Playhouse was the first Tudor theatre on Bankside, built in 1587 and is now an archaeological relic. Events take place in an intimate space against a backdrop of the historic remains of the Elizabethan arena which are illuminated with LED lights to create a unique atmosphere.
Current Events
Past Events
There are no current events for this event organiser. Please contact your event organiser.
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Tuesday 2 March 2021Mudlarks are best described as amateur archaeologists, and Lara Maiklem is one of the best known. What began 20 years ago as a means of escape from the city's chaos has become an obsessive search for hidden history and the objects that Londoners lost or threw away. This talk will focus on the Thames at Bankside and the objects she has found dating from the 16th and early 17th centuries. Lara’s book, Mudlarking: Lost and Found on the River Thames, won the 2020 Indie Book Award for non-fiction.Via Zoom — you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 16 February 2021Lizzie Willis and Doug Gardiner of Re-Shake Theatre will perform Norton and Sackville’s early Elizabethan play The Tragedie of Gorboduc in a version specially adapted for The Rose and introduced by Prof. Ken Pickering. Q&As will follow.Via Zoom — you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 2 February 2021Andrew Wincott, in conversation with Rose volunteer Linda Shannon, will discuss his career in radio, theatre and audio, particularly his life in Ambridge as alter-ego Adam Macy. He has been acting professionally for almost 35 years, working in theatres all over the UK, and sometimes abroad. For nearly 20 years he’s played Adam in The Archers, celebrating its 70th anniversary in 2021, and Simon in the Sony Award-winning Clare in the Community for the BBC.Via Zoom — you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 19 January 2021This live on-line presentation will take us through the latest developments and updates in the research to separate man from myth and give literal voice to a long-dead King of England. You will have an opportunity to learn some Medieval English pronunciation.Via Zoom — you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 15 December 2020In 2008 Gary Andrews adapted Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol for him to perform in character as Dickens, with live piano accompaniment by his (late) wife, Joy. This year, he has produced a special 60-minute version to be streamed live online, with Joy’s recorded accompaniment, exclusively for The Rose. So why not ‘tune in’ to help you get into the spirit of the season with this evergreen classic?Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 8 December 2020Carols Songs and Tunes from the 16th Century. Join acclaimed musicians Chris Green and Sophie Matthews for Christmas 16th-century-style! Featuring a host of midwinter songs, festive carols and rousing tunes played on a variety of authentic period instruments, Drive The Cold Winter Away will transport you back to Yuletides Past.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Monday 30 November 2020In Spring 2022, The Shakespeare North Playhouse will open on the outskirts of Liverpool in Knowsley, near the site of the first known Elizabethan indoor theatre built outside London. Professor Kathy Dacre has been a major force behind the creation of the Playhouse.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 24 November 2020A talk by Frank Whately. The actor Edward Alleyn will forever be associated with the stage of the Bankside Rose and, especially, with the great Marlovian roles of Tamburlaine and Doctor Faustus. Frank Whately will explore Alleyn’s acting career to discover that he was a player of greater variety than is implied by the roles which have so often been used to define him.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 10 November 2020An Actor's Perspective: Leading actor and Shakespeare scholar Michael Pennington discusses how the dramatist’s writing was affected by the nature of the theatres for which he wrote, so very different from those of today. He argues that he and his actors developed a technique that allowed them both the cinematic intimacy and the heroic scale appropriate to the Rose and the Globe and other playhouses.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 27 October 2020This talk will present some of the more unusual uses of plants that arise in Shakespearean scripts. The traditional and structural use of remedies, flowers and poisons were a poetic core of the Shakespearean world. Some of the elements of our modern health practices are easily recognised; others are hidden amid more complicated political narratives.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 13 October 2020OVO theatre company has been navigating these choppy waters and trying to keep live performance afloat with a number of innovative responses — from a Zoom reincarnation of its production of Twelfth Night, originally commissioned by The Rose Playhouse in 2019, to a 3-week open air festival at the Roman Theatre of St Albans, featuring new socially distanced adaptations of Henry V and The Merry Wives of Windsor.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 29 September 2020Philip Henslowe has, for years, been thought of as a one-dimensional character whose image has changed, over time, from that of a shady moneylender to a financier to an entrepreneur. In this webinar, Prof. Cerasano will discuss a few of the ways in which her research fleshes out and recasts Henslowe’s biography beyond this narrow image.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 1 September 2020Over two lectures, Janet will take us through two specific passages in her formidable career. This first one describes her experience of directing Othello — a banned play — in apartheid South Africa, which has many resonances for the Black Lives Matter movement right now.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 18 August 2020Professor Joanne Tompkins, The University of Queensland, will give a presentation which builds on research into the Rose Playhouse as a venue for the performance of early modern plays such as Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus. The investigation deploys virtual reality technology to explore the construction of the venue, the conditions for staging and the effects of being ‘immersed’ in the venue.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 4 August 2020An Artist's journey - join Adrian as he travels through lockdown from Leopoldstadt to horticultural displacement activities using poetry, monologues, diary entries, song, rumination, tragedy, visuals, Shakespeare, humour, allotments and, of course, the de rigueur Q&A session. (The inclusion of listed elements is subject to the artist's whim.)Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 7 July 2020When the Polesden Lacey Shakespeare Company’s open-air production of Romeo and Juliet was cancelled this year due to the lockdown, director Gary Andrews was determined that it wouldn’t disappear without a trace. This is the story of how the company responded to the situation and the challenges this threw up (and the solutions they came up with).Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 23 June 2020Following their 3-night run of A Brief History of Music at the Rose last year, GreenMatthews return to present a special programme of music from the time of Shakespeare. Performed on authentic instruments, the 45-minute concert creates a vivid soundscape of the Elizabethan and Jacobean world. There will also be a question and answer session at the end of the concert.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Tuesday 26 May 2020David will be talking about his experience of setting up the Renaissance Theatre Company with Kenneth Branagh, and about his career as a film producer, including Shakespeare in Love, which features a reconstruction of the Rose as one of its main characters and it won the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 71st Academy Awards.Via Zoom - you will be sent a link once you have booked.
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Monday 9 March 2020Yvonne Morley-Chisholm will present the research that is currently in progress to give literal voice to the late King Richard III, based on evidence being examined since the discovery of his skeleton. The presentation will also include a brief sample of the Original Medieval Pronunciation. Yvonne works in theatre, film, television and with voice-over artists.The Rose Playhouse
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Between Monday 14 October 2019 and Monday 28 October 2019Join us for a walking tour all about the extraordinary life of Edward Alleyn, the principal actor at The Rose Playhouse in the 16th Century. Amble along the streets of London with our knowledgable volunteer, visiting Alleyn's playhouses and learning about Tudor theatre practice. The 2-hour tour will start at Moorgate Underground station and end at Farringdon Underground station, via theatre sites in the Barbican and Clerkenwell, and also the office of the Master of the Revels.Moorgate Underground
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Between Monday 2 September 2019 and Monday 30 September 2019Join us for a walking tour all about the extraordinary life of Edward Alleyn, the principal actor at The Rose Playhouse in the 16th Century. Amble along the streets of London with our knowledgable volunteer, visiting Alleyn's playhouses and learning about Tudor theatre practice. The 2-hour tour will start at Moorgate Underground station and end at Farringdon Underground station, via theatre sites in the Barbican and Clerkenwell, and also the office of the Master of the Revels.Moorgate Underground
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Monday 23 September 2019Professor Tiffany Stern Early, Modern Drama specialist at the Shakespeare Institute of University of Birmingham and a Fellow of the British Academy will talk about staging, walking and speaking for Tragic Performances. She has taught and lectured internationally, and published, edited and contributed to numerous books on the practical side of early modern performance, and is editor of this year’s Rethinking Theatrical Documents in Shakespeare's England.The Rose Playhouse
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Between Tuesday 13 August 2019 and Sunday 18 August 2019Anərkē Shakespeare, a new innovative theatre company, creates raw fast-paced Shakespeare, bringing you the multifaceted text by a diverse, gender-blind, actor-led ensemble without a director, inspired by the working conditions in which Shakespeare conceived his plays. The audience, together with the cast, will work imagination bringing to life the sceptred isle of England, in this film noir, naked-framed perspective of Richard II – Shakespeare’s poetic masterpiece.The Rose Playhouse
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Tuesday 23 July 2019I was 9 when Dad taught me to cycle.. on a cliff. He nearly killed me three times on misadventures- but as a sedentary lifestyle can shorten life expectancy, is staying on the brink of danger the best way to keep alive? An exploration of cycling, life, death and my Dad. Directed by Cariad Lloyd and developed with Luke Touslon "Vanessa is a truly original comedy mind and probably the most charming performer at the Fringe." Sara Pascoe in the i' NewspaperThe Rose Playhouse
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Between Tuesday 21 May 2019 and Thursday 23 May 2019Love Deadline (Desdemona) Othello in Korea, a one-woman act by Ji Young Choi which asks the question: Is there a deadline to love? Bez-Senność Ania Rakowska and Piotr Misztela of Poland’s Teatr Strefa Otwarta present a love story bursting with passion, intrigue and jealously inspired by A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Richard III Emily Carding of Brite Theater presents a one-woman show (with audience) set at Richard's party. Let Richard entertain you…but will you survive?The Rose Playhouse
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Monday 13 May 2019Join us at Southwark Cathedral for our Gala celebration featuring dramatic readings from celebrity patrons including Janet Suzman, and music. Stay on for the Drinks Reception and a Silent Auction with items donated by Judi Dench, Ian McKellen and Tony Robinson, amongst others.Southwark Cathedral
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Saturday 11 May 2019Back by popular demand, 2019 is the fifth year The Rose Playhouse is hosting the Readathon. This is your chance to perform at the first Tudor theatre on Bankside, reading the famous roles of the venue's contemporary playwrights such as Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare. Each performer selects their role from a hat then will have an hour to act out a play, before we rotate and move on to the next title. If you'd rather just watch, then take a seat!The Rose Playhouse
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Between Wednesday 8 May 2019 and Friday 10 May 2019The latest show from acclaimed musicians, Chris Green and Sophie Matthews, takes in 600 years of musical history in just 90 minutes! Beginning in the Middle Ages and ending up in the 20th century (and incorporating everything in between!) this fun and fast-moving show is a whistle-top tour of Western musical history, complete with a bewildering array of instruments such as the hurdy-gurdy, rauschpfeife and vihuela!The Rose Playhouse
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Between Tuesday 23 April 2019 and Sunday 5 May 2019Shakespeare meets Postmodern Jukebox in a musical version of one of his best loved comedies, set on a cruise liner at the height of the roaring twenties. Featuring a live jazz band performing music by Rihanna, Britney Spears, Radiohead, Michael Jackson and many more… Performed by OVO.The Rose Playhouse
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Between Tuesday 22 January 2019 and Sunday 7 April 2019Come and explore the streets of Bankside with our expert guide, who will take you to visit important historic sites in the area. Learn about Bankside's vibrant locality during the heyday of The Rose Playhouse; in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. Beginning outside The Rose Playhouse on Park Street, the group will walk to Borough Market, the remains of Winchester Palace, and the environs of Southwark Cathedral, before returning along the riverside and down Bear Gardens.The Rose Playhouse
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Monday 18 February 2019This talk delivered Chairman of the Marlowe Society, Ken Pickering, explores how Marlowe’s plays reveal an awareness of the performance possibilities of a Tudor playhouse. Ken is also the former Professor of Theatre and Visiting Scholar in Communication and Leadership at Gonzaga University, Washington State. He is currently Honorary Professor of Drama at the University of Kent in Marlowe's home town of Canterbury.The George (Talbot Room)