This week we chat with Charlene V. Smith about one of Shakespeare's most badass broads: Margaret of Anjou.

Charlene V. Smith (she, her, hers) is a director, actor, and scholar with an MLitt and MFA in Shakespeare and Performance from Mary Baldwin University. Formerly the artistic director of Brave Spirits Theatre, her directing credits include Antony and Cleopatra, 'Tis Pity She's a Whore, Coriolanus, The Two Noble Kinsmen, and the first modern professional production of The Bloody Banquet. She is one of the few women in the world to have directed a full cycle of Shakespeare’s Henriad. Brave Spirits Theatre’s project to become the first professional American company to stage the eight English histories in repertory was interrupted by the pandemic, but over the past two years, they have been reimagining this project into audio. The resulting twenty-four episodes will be released later this year. She has essays published in The Palgrave Handbook of Shakespeare’s Queens, Arden Shakespeare’s The Changeling: The State of Play, and the forthcoming The Theatrical Legacy of Thomas Middleton.

Follow Charlene on all social media @charlenevsmith

Visit her website at www.charlenevsmith.com

Bowls with the Bard:

Insta: @stonedshakespeare

TikTok: @BowlswiththeBard

Facebook: Bowls with the Bard

Twitter: @stonedshakespea

Art by Lizzy Colandene

Music by Constantino Fernandez

Sound by Jonathan Miot

Podcast by Micaela Mannix

This week we chat with Fawzia Istrabadi about the challenges and rewards of translating Romeo and Juliet into Arabic.

Fawzia Istrabadi (She/They) is a Shakespeare actor and the creator of Arabic Shakespeare. A half-Iraqi actor who has a passion for creating representation for Arab/SWANA theatre artists. This passion is what led her to team up with Prague Shakespeare Company's Guy Roberts and ShakeSphere's Adham Sayed to create Romeo & جولييت.

You can find ArabicShakespeare on Instagram and Facebook.

Bowls with the Bard:

Insta: @stonedshakespeare

TikTok: @BowlswiththeBard

Facebook: Bowls with the Bard

Twitter: @stonedshakespea

Art by Lizzy Colandene

Music by Constantino Fernandez

Sound by Jonathan Miot

Podcast by Micaela Mannix

Members of our company of Cymbeline give their thoughts on the leading lady who makes our play tick! In order of appearance, Cakes chats with Alison Talvacchio (she/they), Natalie Edwards (she/they), Steph House (she/they), Paige Flores-Medrano (they/them), and Linda Swanson-Brown (she/her).

In the episode, Cakes references a past guest who mentioned that Imogen is the only woman in Shakespeare who cross dresses but does not come up with the idea to do so herself. This thought was originally from Will Shakespleens in season 1.

Find out how to purchase tickets to Stoned Cymbeline here: https://bowlswiththebard.com/stoned-cymbeline

Follow Bowls with the Bard on Social Media:

Insta: @stonedshakespeare

TikTok: @BowlswiththeBard

Facebook: Bowls with the Bard

Twitter: @stonedshakespea

A new season is here and it's for the girls! Broads and the Bard will span the entirety of 2024 and we can't wait to cover the incredible woman and non-binary folks who make Shakespeare possible. Tune in on 2/20 for our first conversation about Imogen!

Bowls with the Bard is excited to announce the United State's first ever stoned Shakespeare experience! September 21=24 we will be producing A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Coffee Joint in Denver. Actors and audience alike will be allowed to indulge in marijuana during the show.

Check out the Coffee Joint here: https://thecoffeejointco.com/

Donate to our production of Midsummer: https://gofund.me/9bf72345

Is all’s well that ends well? This week Karen Shantz and Jackie Madejski try to untangle the tricky web that is All’s Well That Ends Well.

Karen Shantz (she/her) is a writer and performer in Los Angeles. She holds a Bachelor of Music in Musical Theatre from The Benjamin T. Rome School of Music at The Catholic University of America, and has also studied at the Second City Chicago Conservatory and Sketch Programs, and at The London Dramatic Academy. When not writing or performing, she’s probably knitting matching sweaters for herself and her 9 year old rescue dog, Penny. Catch her performing every third Wednesday of the month with her house sketch team, Night Coffee, at the Pack Theatre in Hollywood.

Connect with Karen on all platforms @karen_shantz

Lunaris Podcast: @lunarispodcast on Instagram

Jackie Madejski (she/her/hers) is an actor, singer, dancer, puppeteer, and all-around swell gal. A proud Western New Yorker (go Bills) currently living in the DC area, Jackie has performed in plays, musicals, immersive theater, puppet shows, and of course Shakespeare. You can find Jackie on TikTok (@jdayskee) performing with an ever-growing cast of puppets (most of which were gifts from Cakes.) When not running between in front of her laptop, in-person rehearsals, and her spare bedroom filled with puppets, Jackie enjoys tuning out the world by listening to music and podcasts with her noise canceling headphones (much to her partner’s chagrin).

Follow Jackie on Social Media: @jdayskee (TikTok, Instagram, YouTube)

website: www.jackiemadejski.com

Bowls with the Bard:

Insta: @stonedshakespeare

TikTok: @BowlswiththeBard

Facebook: Bowls with the Bard

Twitter: @stonedshakespea

Art by Lizzy Colandene

Music by Constantino Fernandez

Sound by Jonathan Miot

Podcast by Micaela Mannix

The Merchant of Venice is officially categorized as a problem play… and boy does it present problems. This week we go down the habit hole that is the Merchant of Venice with Terry Burnsed and Stephen Reinstein.

Terry Burnsed (He/Him/His) has been acting in Denver and environs for over four decades. He has a Masters and a PhD from CU Boulder, and served as Dramaturg for (the now defunct) CityStage ["CityStage" is one word here] Ensemble in the 1990s. CSE produced his first play The Heretic's Wake in 1990. He is currently at work on another tentatively titled Bloodthirsty Savages. He has taught theatre at MSU Denver, UC Denver, CCD, CC Aurora, and Front Range CC. Favorite roles include Roy Cohn and Prelapsarianov in Angels in America, Cusins in Major Barbara, King Lear, Titus Andronicus, Leopold Bloom in Chapter 15, Eddie in Hurlyburly, Salieri in Amadeus, Joseph Surface in The School for Scandal, and Feste and Malvoloio in Twelfth Night.

Stephen Reinstein (he/him) is a Boston-based actor, playwright, novelist, and theatre educator. He has performed with Amazing Mustache Productions and Here Comes Everybody Players (HCE), and traveled to Dublin with HCE in 2014 to perform during the Bloomsday Festival. Since 2011, Stephen has been a teaching artist at Wheelock Family Theatre, where he specializes in playwriting classes. From 2012-2015, he oversaw Wheelock's Emerging Playwrights Program for Boston teens, which he also co-founded. In 2019, Stephen took a brief hiatus from his theatre career to focus on parenthood (which also overlapped with surviving a global pandemic). Stephen's favorite Shakespeare play used to be Merchant of Venice but the antisemitism became a bit too hard to ignore, so now it's... let's say Hamlet? (Is that too cliché? I don't know, it's a classic, don't judge me.)

Follow Stephen on Twitter @reinface

Bowls with the Bard:

Insta: @stonedshakespeare

TikTok: @BowlswiththeBard

Facebook: Bowls with the Bard

Twitter: @stonedshakespea

Art by Lizzy Colandene

Music by Constantino Fernandez

Sound by Jonathan Miot

Podcast by Micaela Mannix

The Tempest is one of Shakespeare's most popular plays... It's also one of his most problematic. This week Renea Brown and Aloha Rasmussen explore what it means to safely and responsibly produce The Tempest in 2023.

Renea Brown (she/her) used to hate Shakespeare, so it’s a bit ironic this little black girl from Kentucky, turned into a broadsword-wielding-elizabethan-dancing-classical-actor. She also twerks and uses Megan The Stallions music as a vocal warm up, so you can trust that she's a well rounded human. Renea's favorite play by Billy is Titus Andronicus (fight her), she's played 37 Shakespearean roles, and she's done Macbeth 5 times. If Renea is not on stage, she's watching re-runs of The Office, or she's creating Shakespeare themed gift boxes for her company called Box o’th Bard!

Follow Renea on IG & TikTok: @Therealdarklady

See Renea in the Legend of Georgia McBride in Arizona Theatre Company: https://atc.org/show/the-legend-of-georgia-mcbride/

Logan UhiwaiO’Alohamailani Rasmussen (she/her) is a Kānaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) Chicago-based actor passionate about environmental conservation, community engagement and her indigenous culture. You can call her Aloha! She holds a BFA in Acting from Northern Illinois University, and is represented by Shirley Hamilton Talent, Inc. Recent Chicago credits include Babes with Blades Theatre Company (Richard III), and Theatre Evolve (Krugozor). Regionally she has worked with Great River Shakespeare Festival and Hawaii Shakespeare Festival. Coming up next, Aloha will be performing in Midsommer Flight’s production of Cymbeline, touring parks around Chicago. You can also catch her in an Animal Spotlight, or come along for a tour at Shedd Aquarium!

Follow Aloha on IG: @aloha.rasmussen

See Aloha in Cymbeline: https://midsommerflight.com/cymbeline-summer-2023/

Bowls with the Bard:

Insta: @stonedshakespeare

TikTok: @BowlswiththeBard

Facebook: Bowls with the Bard

Twitter: @stonedshakespea

Art by Lizzy Colandene

Music by Constantino Fernandez

Sound by Jonathan Miot

Podcast by Micaela Mannix