A Christmas Carol 2025
December 4 – 27, 2025
Celebrate the holiday season with A Christmas Carol, a heartwarming production that reminds us of the joy, generosity, and togetherness of the holiday season.
Jay McClure
Playwright
Jay McClure joined the American Shakespeare Center (ASC) in 1999 after working as an actor and arts administrator in New York and later as a project leader for a Fortune 500 company. For ASC, he was instrumental in the opening of the Blackfriars Playhouse and conceived and developed the Actors’ Renaissance Season. He has worked on all of Shakespeare’s plays (most more than once) and dozens of other Early Modern plays. He worked for theatres and arts organizations across the country and is a member of the Actors’ Equity Association and SAG-AFTRA. He’s currently working on an adaptation of Dickens’ Hard Times.
Events featuring Jay McClure
Henry V
Summer and Fall 2021
In this final, epic installment of Shakespeare’s Henriad trilogy, ASC veteran Brandon Carter leads “once more unto the breach” as King Henry V—one of the greatest monarchs in English history. Swashbuckling adventure and romance burst at the seams of this the most exciting of Shakespeare’s histories, which ends, as so many of the great stories do, in a wedding.
Antonio’s Revenge
March 21 - April 5
Antonio's Revenge proves that happily-ever-afters don't always remain so. Breaking from his supposed reformation, the evil Duke Piero resolves again to destroy the relationship of his daughter, Mellida, and her future husband, Antonio - by any means necessary. Writing around the same time as Hamlet, Marston echoes (or foreshadows) Shakespeare's great work with themes of familial betrayal, hauntings, and existential questions that rock us to the core. It's a little bit like Hamlet, a little bit like Quentin Tarantino, a little bit like a weird Italian horror movie, and a whole lot of fun.
The Way of the World
March 1 - April 6
Brimming with sharp and elegant wit, The Way of the World, which critics largely consider the greatest of the Restoration comedies, pits a pair of lovers against a host of manipulative characters, including the underhanded (and unhappily-aging) Lady Wishfort, and the villainous Fainall. Rife with satire, this scathing comedy uncovers the over-the-top, and inner-workings of the idle upper-class.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
February 8 - April 8
From the Oscar winner who gave us Shakespeare in Love, this wickedly funny companion piece to Hamlet turns Shakespeare inside out and shows the Dane's story from the point of view of Hamlet's school chums. Tom Stoppard serves up a feast of wordplay, wit, and slapstick while exploring the timeless questions about identity, illusion, and toe-nail growing.
Richard II
January 20 - April 7
Shakespeare's magnificent exploration of the lives and deaths of England's kings is one of his crowning linguistic achievements. Pitting Richard II, a man of words, against Bullingbrook, a man of action, Shakespeare raises the art of language to new heights, while reminding us that rulers "feel want, taste grief, and need friends." ASC veteran Sarah Fallon wears (and gives away) the crown as Richard.
Hamlet
January 19 - April 7
Hamlet struggles to discern reality from illusion in the rotten state of Denmark as he copes with the loss of his father, his mother's remarriage, and life's biggest questions. For centuries, audiences have seen themselves in the remarkable, troubled prince at the center of this ghost story, comedy, seven-murder revenge thriller, and philosopher's gold mine.
King John
September 20 – November 24, 2012
One of Shakespeare’s most exciting plays, King John continues the thrilling story of what happens after the events in The Lion in Winter. John, now king, continues his family’s outrageous game of capture the crown. Mad world. Mad kings. Madly entertaining. Don’t miss this rare chance to see King John and The Lion in Winter performed in repertory with actors playing the same characters who appear in each.
The Lion in Winter
June 19 – November 24, 2012
Epic and intimate. Brilliantly funny and deeply moving. The Lion in Winter plays out the spectacular strategies for power and love between two of England’s most formidable and most human rulers, King Henry II and Queen Eleanor, and their three crown-hungry sons. Telling the story of what happens before Shakespeare’s King John, The Lion in Winter is a modern theatrical masterpiece.
The Two Gentlemen of Verona
July 8 – November 23, 2012
A gleeful look at love and a dramatic examination of friendship, Two Gents has one of Shakespeare’s most engaging comic heroines, one of his funniest clowns, and the best role ever for a dog. Jealous lovers, a cross-dressing heroine, and a daring escape into the forest make this romp simultaneously a familiar and completely surprising trip.
Cymbeline
September 4 – November 25, 2012
In this magical, violent, and beguiling comedy, Imogen — Shakespeare’s brave and virtuous heroine — must endure a series of humiliating trials before all is set right through the astonishing revelations that end the play. Loved for its ravishingly beautiful language and enthralling storytelling, Cymbeline has long been a cult favorite in which Shakespeare forces his characters to take a leap of faith and, when they do, they and the audience discover that miracles can happen even when it seems that all is lost.
The Merchant of Venice
June 20 – November 23, 2012
From Shylock’s unjust Venice to Portia’s golden Belmont, The Merchant of Venice is at once a comic love story and a passionate discourse on justice and mercy. Both entertaining and disturbing, this magnificent comedy will have you asking “who are the heroes and who are the villains?”