Shakespeare in the Streets Project History

A Sonnet Walk is a site-specific event that is part self-guided tour, part promenade performance. The audience are given a specially written route to follow and as they walk they encounter actors who perform 14 line poems as if they were mini-plays.

Sonnet Walks have been shown to be a unique way of allowing audiences to view and interact with their surroundings. We feel that Sonnet Walks in Liverpool celebrate the city and its inhabitants. Shakespeare’s Sonnets depict love, in all its forms, and as such are timeless and speak to everyone. The Sonnet Walk brings the modern and the classical into dialogue, creating a piece of theatre that is different to any other theatre event.

The Liverpool Sonnet Walk was produced last year by Lodestar Theatre Company to coincide with Shakespeare’s birthday. They attracted a diverse audience from Liverpool and further afield. The idea was originally inspired by Mark Rylance’s Sonnet Walks for Shakespeare’s Globe in London, but Abigail Anderson has developed the idea into successful walks that have taken place in New York, London and Truro – not only using Shakespeare’s sonnets but also work by other poets.

Building on last year’s event and working with Abigail, the original director, as well as many of the same actors we feel we could take the event forwards as a regular feature on Liverpool’s cultural calendar, appealing to Shakespeare fans and new audiences alike.

Meet the team behind Shakespeare in the Streets

Abigail Anderson – Co-Director

Abigail is a freelance director with more than fifty productions to her credit, in London and regionally, “one of the most exciting and eclectic young directors in the UK” (Oxford Times). Recent work includes: Oliver Twist on tour for Love and Madness Ensemble; Art on tour for Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmund’s, Between the Dark and the Daylight; ghost stories in the London Bridge vaults; Sweet Witchery, a gothic evening performed on a canal barge; Clamjamfry, a specially commissioned show performed in a Mayfair Art Gallery; a devised slapstick show about the Criminal Justice System which toured nationally and to the Pleasance in Edinburgh, You Don’t Need to Know That…; Physick Lies a-Bleeding, a satirical comedy from 1697 at Apothecaries’ Hall in the City of London; Romeo and Juliet and a new adaptation of A Christmas Carol for Creation Theatre Company in Oxford; and the world premiere of Tennessee William’s Like Candles to the Sun in the Platform Series at the Cottesloe, Royal National Theatre. Abigail has also worked as an Assistant Director for the Royal Shakespeare Company and Shakespeare’s Globe. She is proud to be part of the Restoring the Repertoire project at the Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds.

Andrew Girvan – Producer

Andrew is a theatre producer and performing arts manager. Having grown up in Edinburgh Andrew was drawn to the city’s annual Fringe Festival and has taken on a number of roles with companies and venues working as C venues Box Office Manager. Having gained his Associates Diploma in Musical Theatre from the London College of Music Andrew has a passion for musical theatre and will be undertaking a placement with Perfect Pitch Musical Development and Andy Barnes Productions this autumn. Andrew has experience in a number of aspects of new media production and marketing and was one of the first podcaters at the Edinburgh Fringe hosting the Whispered Prompt Podcast in 2006. Working as Station Manager of Re:place Radio he has built an audience for a network of 15 podcasts. An experienced Theatre Manager, Andrew has overseen front of house work teams at theatres in Liverpool and Edinburgh. Andrew is currently studying Music, Theatre and Entertainment Management at Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts.

Eyal Israel – Co-Director

Eyal’s theatre credits include: Directing PVT Wars by James McLure, QED by Peter Parnell and assisting Abigail Anderson on The Mill on the Floss and All’s Well that Ends Well & Oliver Twist, and Neil Sheppeck on La Ronde. Eyal’s film credits include: Second Assistant Cameraman on The Dress.

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