Improvised Shakespeare Company

Published by austin on

Chicago’s Improvised Shakespeare Company celebrates its 20th anniversary in 2025, and founder/director Blaine Swen discusses the company’s humble origins and how it now performs regularly in Chicago and Los Angeles and tours all across America. Blaine shares performing secrets; the nature of the high-wire act of improvising in iambic pentameter; how this stuff can be learned; how several of every performance’s signature moments began as an attempt to solve a technical problem; and how the audience is the key ingredient to the alchemical magic that makes each performance work. (Length 19:39) CLICK HERE TO READ AUSTIN TICHENOR’S FOLGER SHAKESPEARE LIBRARY ARTICLE ABOUT ISC! (PICTURED: ISC members Sayjal Joshi, Beth Melewski, Blaine Swen, Ric Walker, and Andy Carey, photographed by Jill Petracek.)

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