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These informal, online conversations will investigate approaches to essential passages from the Shakespearean and Jacobean canon―and beyond.

burton tempest.jpg

"I'LL DROWN MY BOOK"

WITH KATE BURTON

LIVESTREAM RECORDING
Monday, June 22, 2020 | 7:30 PM EDT

Three-time Tony and Emmy Award-nominee KATE BURTON will joined host NATHAN WINKELSTEIN, Red Bull’s Associate Producer, for a conversation focused on Prospero’s famous soliloquy from Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Burton performed the role of Prospera in 2018 at The Old Globe in San Diego under the direction of Joe Dowling. She read passages from the play and discussed her thoughts on the text, character, and gender in Shakespeare.

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EXCERPT FROM THE TEMPEST | Act 5: Scene 1
 
ARIEL

Your charm so strongly works 'em

That if you now beheld them, your affections

Would become tender.

​

PROSPERO

Dost thou think so, spirit?

​

ARIEL

Mine would, sir, were I human.

​

PROSPERO

And mine shall.

Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling

Of their afflictions, and shall not myself,

One of their kind, that relish all as sharply,

Passion as they, be kindlier moved than thou art?

Though with their high wrongs I am struck to the quick,

Yet with my nobler reason 'gaitist my fury

Do I take part: the rarer action is

In virtue than in vengeance: they being penitent,

The sole drift of my purpose doth extend

Not a frown further. Go release them, Ariel:

My charms I'll break, their senses I'll restore,

And they shall be themselves.

​

ARIEL

I'll fetch them, sir.

​

Exit

 

PROSPERO

Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes and groves,

And ye that on the sands with printless foot

Do chase the ebbing Neptune and do fly him

When he comes back; you demi-puppets that

By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make,

Whereof the ewe not bites, and you whose pastime

Is to make midnight mushrooms, that rejoice

To hear the solemn curfew; by whose aid,

Weak masters though ye be, I have bedimm'd

The noontide sun, call'd forth the mutinous winds,

And 'twixt the green sea and the azured vault

Set roaring war: to the dread rattling thunder

Have I given fire and rifted Jove's stout oak

With his own bolt; the strong-based promontory

Have I made shake and by the spurs pluck'd up

The pine and cedar: graves at my command

Have waked their sleepers, oped, and let 'em forth

By my so potent art. But this rough magic

I here abjure, and, when I have required

Some heavenly music, which even now I do,

To work mine end upon their senses that

This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff,

Bury it certain fathoms in the earth,

And deeper than did ever plummet sound

I'll drown my book.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS
The daughter of two celebrated Shakespearean actors, KATE BURTON has played Viola, Juliet, Desdemona, and Isabella. Her performances in both Coriolanus and Cymbeline for Shakespeare in the Park, were uniformly praised, and in 2018 she was lauded for her Prospera in The Tempest for the Old Globe. A three-time Tony and Emmy Award nominee, she was last seen on Broadway opposite Kevin Kline in Present Laughter. On television, she is best known for her work in “Scandal” and “Grey’s Anatomy.”
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NATHAN WINKELSTEIN has been with Red Bull Theater for three years, serving as Producing Director of The Revelation Reading Series, Education Director of Shakespeare in Schools and the Masterclass offerings. He also serves as a literary and casting associate for Red Bull. Nathan is also the NY Casting Associate for American Shakespeare Center. He has acted or directed for numerous companies around the country and in the UK, including Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, Shakespeare Theater Company, W.H.A.T., LCT, The Folger, The Tobacco Factory, American Shakespeare Center and others. Nathan has taught for Red Bull, STC, LCT, WHAT, TGS and Shakespeare Forum; he also provides private acting coaching in NYC. Nathan received his BA in Theater from the University at Buffalo and his MFA in Classical Acting from the prestigious Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in the UK. Nathan is a proud member of Actors Equity.
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