Shakespeare Schools Festival

The Shakespeare Schools Festival began in 2000. 2000 Shakespeare Schools Festival, Pembrokeshire: 8 schools, 240 pupils, 1 theatre
In 2000, Chris Grace, Director of Animation at S4C and Executive Producer of Shakespeare: The Animated Tales, and Penelope Middelboe, Series Editor of the same series, launched the Shakespeare Schools Festival (SSF). Leon Garfield's 12 abridgements for the animated series were made available by S4C to pupils and their teacher-directors from eight schools in Pembrokeshire. These secondary school students performed over two nights to sell-out audiences at the Torch Theatre, Milford Haven.

2001 Shakespeare Schools Festival, London: 60 schools, 1,500 pupils, 3 theatres October 2001 saw 1,800 pupils from 60 inner city London schools performing in three professional theatres. The Festival culminated in a Gala night at the West End’s Duke of York’s Theatre, which was attended by Cherie Booth QC and the Secretary of State DCMS, Tessa Jowell, who called the evening “one of the year’s cultural highlights”.

2002 Shakespeare Schools Festival, Wales: 100 schools, 2,500 pupils, 10 theatres With the support of the Welsh Assembly Government, the Arts Council of Wales and Cardiff 2002, Jenny Randerson AM launched the Wales 2002 Festival in the Old Library, Cardiff on 17 September. 3,000 pupils from 100 schools across the country performed in Welsh, English or bilingually, in one of 11 professional theatres.

2003 Shakespeare Schools Festival, South West, West Midlands & Yorkshire Embarking on a three year cycle to cover the whole of England and Wales, the Festival was launched nationwide at a reception hosted by Cherie Booth QC at 10 Downing St. 8,500 young actors from 340 schools performed in 32 theatres across the regions. Three schools were picked to perform at a private reception for the Washington state visit in Downing Street, in front of an audience which included Tom Stoppard and Philip Pullman. They went on to perform again for the Arts & Kids 'Million Kids' launch at the Hackney Empire in the presence of HRH the Prince of Wales.

2004 Shakespeare Schools Festival, London, North West, East England The year started with a fund-raising performance at the West End’s Peacock Theatre in the presence of HRH the Prince of Wales and Festival Patron, Kwame Kwei-Armah. In the summer one of the London schools took part in the National Youth Theatre’s 'Shakespeare In The Square event', securing themselves coverage on BBC London’s regional news. During the festival 10,000 pupils from 380 schools performed in 38 theatres.

2005 Shakespeare Schools Festival, East Midlands, North East & South East England Tom Stoppard’s abridgement of The Merchant of Venice was premiered at the Linbury Theatre, Royal Opera House by a company of 2004 Festival performers and the National Youth Theatre. During the same year the BBC invited SSF to stage a one-day Festival in 100 theatres across the UK on Sunday July 3, as the launch of their Shakespeare Season, One Night of Shakespeare. Schools performed in theatres from the Shetland Isles to Bodmin, from Enniskillen to Margate and set the model for the Festival to become fully UK-national. SSF attained a place in the Guinness Book of Records. 20,000 pupils from 800 schools performed in 140 theatres.

2007 Shakespeare Schools Festival, UK-wide For the first time, the Shakespeare Schools Festival is held across the entire UK between the 5–9 February 2007. 22,000 pupils from 1056 schools performed in 110 theatres. A fund-raising dinner was held at the Middle Temple, hosted by Anna Ford and Charles Dance. Cameo performances from participating schools were held at the National Theatre hosted by patron Nicholas Hytner.

2008 SYF, S24, Shakespeare in the City and Festival February–March 2008 saw the launch of the Shakespeare Youth Festival (SYF), a UK-wide pilot which gave 16-21 year olds the opportunity to set up their own theatre company, to direct, produce, manage, market and perform their own 45 minute abridegment of a Shakespeare play. 118 groups took part in 35 theatres.

Shakespeare 24 (S24) was an exciting worldwide Shakespeare performance event beginning in New Zealand and ending 24 hours later in Hawaii on April 23, 2008. 65 youth groups from 35 countries staged 30 and 45 minute adaptations of Shakespeare's plays at 7pm, local time on Shakespeare’s 444th birthday. One of the best productions from SYF, Jamila Gavin's abridgement of Measure for Measure was performed by the National Youth Theatre at Playhouse in Liverpool. The event was appraised by Phil Redmond, director of Liverpool, European Capital of Culture. As part of the European Capital of Culture year SSF worked throughout Liverpool, with young companies from the Shakespeare Youth Festival performing in 33 venues and locations from museums and cathedrals to parks and bombed out churches.

To cap off a busy year, Shakespeare Schools Festival returned in the Autumn with 10,000 pupils from 500 Schools performing in 60 theatres UK-wide.

2009 Shakespeare Schools Festival, UK-wide SSF joined in partnership with the National Theatre (providers of the Teacher Director workshops) and the National Youth Theatre (providers of the Cast workshops). NT directors and actors such as Carl Heap, Dominic Hill, Adrian Lester, Phyllida Lloyd, Hattie Morahan joined Nicholas Hytner in giving master classes for teachers. A contemporary script based on All's Well That Ends Well, written by Lucinda Coxon, was offered by the NT to teachers who had done SSF before. Jenny Agutter appraised performances at The Unicorn Theatre, Southwark and became a festival patron. 10,000 young people from 500 schools performed in 67 theatres.

2010 Shakespeare Schools Festival, UK-wide Over 10,000 young people from 500 schools performed in 70 theatres. Dame Harriet Walter became a patron.

2011 Shakespeare Schools Festival, UK-wide
In July 2011 SSF held one of its more unusual fundraising events, putting Romeo on trial for the murder of Tybalt at Gray's Inn. SSF patrons Philip Pullman and Jenny Agutter took the witness stand in the roles of Friar and Nurse. Criminal QCs for the defence included John Kelsey-Fry QC and Claire Montgomery QC.

Also in 2011 SSF ran audition workshops for 2000 young people across the UK for BBC Learning's project Off By Heart Shakespeare. Eight finalists from each of the nine regions were filmed delivering their Shakespeare speeches. Festival Director, Chris Grace, whittled these down to just nine young finalists who spent three days with the RSC at Stratford before taking part in a filmed final in the main theatre at Stratford with Jeremy Paxman as host. Judges were Simon Schama, Imogen Stubbs and Sam West

For the first time the festival is offered to primary schools, in a pilot project involving 50 primaries. In total 13,000 young people from 600 schools performed in 80 theatres. Francesca Martinez became a patron.

2012 Shakespeare Schools Festival, UK-wide In 2012 SSF was invited by the British Museum education department to run workshops for secondary school students visiting the Shakespeare: staging the world exhibition. 17,500 young people from 700 schools (179 primary) performed in 90 theatres. Michael Rosen and Ralph Fiennes both became patrons.