Page to Players: Residencies
F.M. Kirby Shakespeare Theatre / The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, 36 Madison Avenue, Madison, NJ 07940
About
Page to Players: Residencies gives students the chance to collaborate with peers and teaching artists while working directly with Shakespeare’s text. Depending on the residency, students engage in predictive reading, explore phonics and the etymology of words, utilize context clues, interpret language, story, and character, and explore theme, tone, and story structure. Sessions include theatre exercises and games, public speech, physical storytelling, performance-based exploration of a single Shakespeare play, and staging scenes that lead to a final presentation of an abridged play or shorter passages.
• Ages: 9–16 years old
• Schedule: The 20-Day Play Immersion Residency runs over four to six weeks, the 10-Day Intensive includes about ten sessions over two to three weeks, and the 3-Day/4-Day Introduction consists of 3 or 4 days.
The 20-Day Play Immersion Residency is described as one of The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey’s most high-impact education programs and commonly explores plays such as A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Tempest, Macbeth, and Julius Caesar, culminating in a 35–40 minute abridged presentation for peers, parents, and/or community members. The 10-Day Intensive focuses on shorter passages or scenes, with past projects including The Henry Project (with selections from Henry V), The Hamlet Project (featuring four major speeches from Hamlet), and projects centered on Romeo & Juliet, Julius Caesar, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, usually ending in a 10–15 minute final project. The 3-Day/4-Day Introduction equips students with a foundation in Shakespeare in a few sessions and typically focuses on the opening sequences of Romeo & Juliet, and can be customized for grades 4–10 and different class sizes.
Residencies incorporate strategies for decoding and interpreting Shakespeare’s text, exploration of Elizabethan drama, special art projects, Shakespeare Journals, and a Shakespeare Blog, often in collaboration with classroom teachers. Collaborations have taken place with schools including Madison Middle School; P.S. 13 in Jersey City; Normandy Park School and Alexander Hamilton School in Morristown; Forest Street School in Orange; Glenwood Elementary School in Short Hills; Harding Township School in New Vernon; and Quibbletown, Conackamack, and T. Schor Middle Schools in Piscataway. The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey notes that residencies tackle many of the NJ Student Learning Standards and that teaching artists work in partnership with classroom teachers to coordinate work with curriculum and educational objectives.
The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey is under the leadership of Artistic Director Brian B. Crowe and is now in its 64th season. Its mission is to bring new, relevant life to the world’s classics for a diverse audience and to use those masterworks to provide transformative experiences on stage and in classrooms, using the classics as interdisciplinary teaching tools for artist training and arts education. It is one of the leading Shakespeare theatres in the nation, New Jersey’s largest professional theatre company dedicated to Shakespeare’s canon and other classic masterworks, and the longest-running Shakespeare theatre on the East Coast. The company has been named “Regional Theatre of the Year” by The Star-Ledger in 2002 and 2006, was singled out by The Wall Street Journal in 2014 as “The Best Company of the Year,” and received a $1 million Strategic Partnership Grant from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation in 2002.
The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey serves approximately 40,000 adults and children annually, works with over 200 artists and students each year, and plays to about 75,000 audience members from New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Through its involvement with Drew University, the Theatre provides theatre students the opportunity to enjoy an active relationship with New Jersey’s only professional theatre dedicated to the classics and continues to build a culturally and geographically diverse audience through non-traditional casting and outreach efforts. Student comments about the residencies include, “I was surprised by how easy the residency made it to actually understand Shakespeare!” (Brett, 5th Grader, Glenwood Elementary School), “I realized I was more capable than I thought.” (Jeffrey, Normandy Park Elementary School), and “I had a ball…It was the most fun I had this year!” (Connor, Normandy Park Elementary School).
Last updated July 28, 2026.
• Ages: 9–16 years old
• Schedule: The 20-Day Play Immersion Residency runs over four to six weeks, the 10-Day Intensive includes about ten sessions over two to three weeks, and the 3-Day/4-Day Introduction consists of 3 or 4 days.
The 20-Day Play Immersion Residency is described as one of The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey’s most high-impact education programs and commonly explores plays such as A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Tempest, Macbeth, and Julius Caesar, culminating in a 35–40 minute abridged presentation for peers, parents, and/or community members. The 10-Day Intensive focuses on shorter passages or scenes, with past projects including The Henry Project (with selections from Henry V), The Hamlet Project (featuring four major speeches from Hamlet), and projects centered on Romeo & Juliet, Julius Caesar, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, usually ending in a 10–15 minute final project. The 3-Day/4-Day Introduction equips students with a foundation in Shakespeare in a few sessions and typically focuses on the opening sequences of Romeo & Juliet, and can be customized for grades 4–10 and different class sizes.
Residencies incorporate strategies for decoding and interpreting Shakespeare’s text, exploration of Elizabethan drama, special art projects, Shakespeare Journals, and a Shakespeare Blog, often in collaboration with classroom teachers. Collaborations have taken place with schools including Madison Middle School; P.S. 13 in Jersey City; Normandy Park School and Alexander Hamilton School in Morristown; Forest Street School in Orange; Glenwood Elementary School in Short Hills; Harding Township School in New Vernon; and Quibbletown, Conackamack, and T. Schor Middle Schools in Piscataway. The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey notes that residencies tackle many of the NJ Student Learning Standards and that teaching artists work in partnership with classroom teachers to coordinate work with curriculum and educational objectives.
The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey is under the leadership of Artistic Director Brian B. Crowe and is now in its 64th season. Its mission is to bring new, relevant life to the world’s classics for a diverse audience and to use those masterworks to provide transformative experiences on stage and in classrooms, using the classics as interdisciplinary teaching tools for artist training and arts education. It is one of the leading Shakespeare theatres in the nation, New Jersey’s largest professional theatre company dedicated to Shakespeare’s canon and other classic masterworks, and the longest-running Shakespeare theatre on the East Coast. The company has been named “Regional Theatre of the Year” by The Star-Ledger in 2002 and 2006, was singled out by The Wall Street Journal in 2014 as “The Best Company of the Year,” and received a $1 million Strategic Partnership Grant from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation in 2002.
The Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey serves approximately 40,000 adults and children annually, works with over 200 artists and students each year, and plays to about 75,000 audience members from New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Through its involvement with Drew University, the Theatre provides theatre students the opportunity to enjoy an active relationship with New Jersey’s only professional theatre dedicated to the classics and continues to build a culturally and geographically diverse audience through non-traditional casting and outreach efforts. Student comments about the residencies include, “I was surprised by how easy the residency made it to actually understand Shakespeare!” (Brett, 5th Grader, Glenwood Elementary School), “I realized I was more capable than I thought.” (Jeffrey, Normandy Park Elementary School), and “I had a ball…It was the most fun I had this year!” (Connor, Normandy Park Elementary School).
Last updated July 28, 2026.
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