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The BARD Project: Richard the Second
by Willian Shakespeare
2026 development workshop weekend
ReadyMade Works Rehearsal Studio, Sydney, Australia.
2026 Actors Ensemble
From left: Roger Adam Smith, Mary Haire, Richard Mason, Chloe Schwank, Othniel Mani, Penny Day & Christine Greenough.
On Saturday the 11th of April the focus was on The Discontentment Scenes in the play. These are the scenes that give vent to the grievances, issues, covert plans, plots, desires and lengths that all characters will go to achieve their individual/collective ends, whatever they may be.
From these scenes, we realize there are numerous cracks in the socio/political fabric of the realm upon which Richard's power is leveraged on.
Even though he has the divine right of succession on his side, it's never a guarantee of monarchial success in all thing's governance.
Running a country requires extensive temporal power too - loyalists, a substantial standing army, money in the Ex-Checker's Purse, political allies, ecclesial sanction, aristocratic support, international favor and the support of the common folk no matter what class they were in.
The Table Read:
For the scene work on Saturday, the day started with a table read so that we could gain an insight into the context and circumstances of critical moments in specific scenes that would be put on the floor in the afternoon block.
Saturday workshop key foci -
*Contextualizing relationships.
*Establishing circumstances.
*Drilling down into the key interpersonal relationships in specific scenes at that point in the play.
3 Scenes, 7 Actors, Multiple roles
Saturday Floor Work:
With script-in-hand, actors put the scenes on the floor in the afternoon session. The foci were on interpersonal relationships - John of Gaunt and his son, Bolingbroke; Aumerle and his relationship with Richard; the three Lords - Northumberland / Ross / Willoughby - who form a clandestine comradery upon realizing they all have similar deep concerns about Richard's unfitness to rule.
Gaining insight into these characters relationships is the key to understanding why they behave the way they do at these specific moments in the play's narrative. Subsequent plot lines suddenly make sense.
John of Gaunt gives fatherly solace to his son, Henry Bolingbroke, who has been banished from England. With Bolingbroke out of the way, Richard perpetrates an illegal act of possession. And by doing so, unwittingly initiates his own demise by plays' end.
Aumerle joins a covert meeting during which Richard & his long-time confidants test his loyalty & resolve.
The Lords Northumberland, Ross & Willoughby discover they have shared concerns about the King. As they do, the meeting suddenly becomes dangerous and their utterences tantamount to treason.
On Sunday 12th of April, the focus was on The Revelation Monologue Mash-Ups, an intentional editing process which blended and merged various speeches of the following characters into extended monologues - Henry Bolingbroke, John of Gaunt, Duchess of Gloucester, Queen Isabelle, Bishop of Carlisle, The Gardner and the Duchess of York.
Used strictly as a workshopping 'discovery' tactic, editing shorter speeches from dialogue sections into an extended monologue mash-up, allows the 'isolated' voice of the character to reveal backstory, define relationships, admit vulnerabilities, extoll emotional states without interruption from other characters. A sharper insight is also gained into why their loyalties and allegiances have been tested, eroded and questioned.
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