Fun Shakespeare Plays for Middle School and High School Students
I have had a lifelong love affair with Shakespeare.
For my 16th birthday, I received a copy of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. Years later, I even wove verses from A Midsummer Night's Dream into my wedding vows. So yes, you could say Shakespeare and I go back a long way!
But my experience of Shakespeare at school was rather different.
Like so many students, we were handed his plays and expected to read them, either silently or aloud in front of the class. We stumbled through unfamiliar words, struggled to understand what was happening and often missed the humour, passion and sheer theatrical brilliance of the stories.
And really, is it any wonder?
Shakespeare wasn't written simply to be read. His plays were written to be performed. To be heard. To be seen. To be experienced.
As a drama teacher and playwright, I've spent much of my career finding ways to bring Shakespeare off the page and onto the stage, particularly for young performers.
Because Shakespeare doesn't have to be difficult, daunting or deadly serious. In fact, he can be an enormous amount of fun!
Why Shakespeare Works So Well for Young Performers (When We Let Them Play!)
There's something wonderful about watching young actors discover Shakespeare through performance. The language that once seemed so intimidating on the page suddenly comes alive when students are given permission to move, experiment, exaggerate, laugh and make mistakes.
And let's face it, Shakespeare gives us plenty to play with!
Jealous lovers, murderous monarchs, mischievous fairies, mistaken identities, sword fights, ghosts, witches and spectacularly bad decisions. His plays are bursting with characters and situations that young performers can really sink their teeth into.
The trick, I think, is finding the right way into the story.
Start with the action, not the analysis. Let students explore the characters physically, experiment with dialogue and discover the humour and drama through rehearsal. Understanding often follows the doing.
Don't be afraid of comedy. Even Shakespeare's tragedies contain wonderfully theatrical moments. Humour can be a fantastic way to help students engage with unfamiliar language and complicated storylines.
Make room for the ensemble. School productions are about giving students opportunities to perform, not simply finding a handful of talented actors to carry an entire show. Flexible casting, narrators, physical theatre and ensemble scenes can make Shakespeare accessible to a much larger group.
Keep the language alive. I don't believe we need to remove Shakespeare's words to make his stories accessible. Instead, we can create theatrical situations that help students understand what those words mean and why they're being spoken.
Over the years, these ideas have shaped the Shakespeare adaptations I've written for young performers. Some are fast and gloriously silly retellings of the original plays. Others weave contemporary teenagers into Shakespeare's worlds, where the boundaries between reality and fiction begin to blur.
Here are a few different approaches to bringing Shakespeare to life with middle school and high school students.
Short, Fast and Funny Shakespeare Plays for Schools
Sometimes the best introduction to Shakespeare is to throw students straight into the action.
A ten or twenty-minute version of an entire Shakespeare play might sound ambitious, but there's something wonderfully liberating about telling these enormous stories at breakneck speed!
Ten Minute Macbeth
Running time: 10 minutes Cast: 8–25+ actors
All the murder, madness, witches, ambition and spectacularly bad decisions of Macbeth, crammed into ten gloriously chaotic minutes!
Ten Minute Macbeth is a fast, funny retelling of the entire tragedy, incorporating the major characters, plot points, themes and key Shakespearean quotations. Narrators guide the audience through the action, commenting on events and keeping the story moving at a cracking pace.
It's a particularly fun introduction to Macbeth for middle school students, giving performers a surprisingly comprehensive understanding of Shakespeare's original.
Twenty Minute Romeo and Juliet
Running time: 20 minutes, with opportunities to extend Cast: 8–25+ actors, ensemble-driven and gender-flexible
The greatest love story ever told. And retold. And retold again. But can we squeeze the whole thing into twenty minutes?
With a timekeeper watching the clock, Twenty Minute Romeo and Juliet races through the feuding families, forbidden romance, dramatic misunderstandings and inevitable tragedy, with plenty of silliness along the way.
Like Ten Minute Macbeth, it incorporates Shakespeare's key scenes, characters, themes and original dialogue, with narrators helping audiences follow the story.
It's also a lovely choice for high school performers who want to expand the production with choreographed sword fights, dance sequences and other theatrical flourishes. You could easily stretch it to thirty minutes.
Both plays are fast, silly and funny, but underneath all that chaos is a comprehensive retelling of Shakespeare's original story.
A Little Shakespearean Magic
One of the things I love most about A Midsummer Night's Dream is the way Shakespeare plays with the boundaries between dreams and reality. It's a wonderful starting point for young performers because the world is already so delightfully unpredictable.
I've written two adaptations exploring this idea: Bottom's Dream, a shorter ensemble comedy, and The Dream, a longer version incorporating the lovers' storyline.
Both are comedic, magical-realist retellings that weave contemporary teenage characters into Shakespeare's enchanted world, alongside his original characters and dialogue.
Bottom's Dream
Running time: 35–40 minutes Cast: 8–20+ actors
A group of teenagers head into a forest to rehearse scenes from A Midsummer Night's Dream for a Shakespearean gala. Unfortunately, they've chosen a forest inhabited by Titania, Puck and a particularly mischievous collection of fairies.
When Nick, an enthusiastic young actor playing Bottom, becomes separated from his friends, he finds himself caught up in the real magic of Shakespeare's enchanted world.
The trouble is, Nick thinks the fairies are simply another exceptionally talented group of actors!
Completely oblivious to the magic unfolding around him, Nick's earnest commitment to his role convinces Titania that she's found her perfect Bottom.
Bottom's Dream is full of physical comedy, theatrical misunderstandings and opportunities for ensemble work. It's particularly suited to groups who enjoy playful, energetic performance.
The Dream
Running time: Approximately 70 minutes Cast: 8–20+ actors, with opportunities for a larger ensemble
The Dream takes the magical world of Bottom's Dream and expands it to include the lovers' storyline.
During rehearsals for a Shakespearean gala at St Athenian's High School, students begin to transform into the characters they're playing.
As Shakespeare's enchanted forest takes hold, Helena realises that she may have to fight to change the ending of a story written more than four hundred years ago.
Meanwhile, Nick and the Mechanicals are causing their own particular brand of chaos in the forest, with Puck and Titania gleefully adding to the confusion.
The play follows the structure of Shakespeare's original while blending contemporary teenage characters with the lovers, Mechanicals and fairies.
It's a fun choice for high school ensembles looking for a longer production, particularly those wanting to explore character transformation, physical theatre and the wonderfully complicated relationships at the heart of A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Shakespeare Meets the Modern World
What happens when contemporary teenagers collide with Shakespeare's world?
These next two plays explore that question in very different ways.
The Playhouse
Running time: 35–40 minutes. Cast: 12–30+ actors, with 30 speaking roles and unlimited ensemble opportunities
Imagine visiting Shakespeare's Globe Theatre on a school excursion and accidentally finding yourself transported back to 1599!
That's exactly what happens to five mischievous students in The Playhouse.
After sneaking backstage, trying on costumes and reciting the Globe's famous motto, Totus Mundus Agit Histrionem — The Whole World is a Playhouse — they find themselves thrust into Shakespeare's original theatre, where preparations are underway for As You Like It.
Mistaken for actors, costume mistresses, nobility and groundlings, the students must navigate Elizabethan London, find one another and somehow make their way home.
It's a riotous, time-travelling action-adventure that introduces young performers to Shakespeare's theatrical world, the Globe Theatre and the colourful characters who inhabited it.
With its large, flexible ensemble and opportunities for comedy, movement and theatrical mayhem, The Playhouse is particularly well suited to school productions.
The Curse of Macbeth
Running time: 35–40 minutes, Cast: 19+ actors
What could possibly go wrong when a group of drama students decide to rehearse Macbeth while their regular teacher is away?
Quite a lot, apparently!
Left in the reluctant care of a cynical PE teacher known as 'the Beck', the students begin rehearsing scenes from Macbeth, despite the legendary theatrical curse.
Meanwhile, a lovestruck student decides that invoking the curse might be the perfect way to win someone's heart.
Combining school drama, supernatural mischief, romantic chaos and a performance of Ten Minute Macbeth, this female-heavy comedy offers plenty of opportunities for physical theatre and ensemble fun.
But is the curse really responsible for the strange happenings in the theatre? Or is someone simply having a little too much fun with the lighting and sound equipment?
For Something Completely Different:
Shakespeare Bachelor
Running time: 40–60 minutes Cast: 10 female and 2 male roles
What if William Shakespeare entered a reality television dating show to find the greatest character he'd ever written?
Welcome to Shakespeare Bachelor, where ten of Shakespeare's most famous women compete for Will's final rose.
Lady Macbeth, Ophelia, Titania, Juliet, Cordelia, Beatrice, Viola, Katherine, Tamora and Cleopatra are all determined to win Shakespeare's heart — and none of them intends to go quietly!
Guided by the show's lovable host, Osher, the Bachelorettes battle it out in a wonderfully ridiculous competition for love, glory and Shakespearean immortality.
It's a playful way to introduce students to a wide range of Shakespearean characters, with particularly strong opportunities for female performers.
And let's face it, Shakespeare's women have never been short on opinions!
Finding the Right Shakespeare Play for Your Students
Whether you're introducing younger students to Shakespeare for the first time, looking for a short performance piece or planning a full-length high school production, I think the most important thing is to find a play that gives your students the confidence to explore, experiment and have fun.
Shakespeare's stories have survived for more than four hundred years because they're extraordinary pieces of theatre. They're full of love, jealousy, ambition, betrayal, magic, mischief and wonderfully complicated human beings.
And the best way to discover all of that?
Get up on your feet and play!
If you're considering one of my Shakespeare adaptations for your students, I'm always happy to help you find a suitable script or provide a perusal copy.
You can contact me at kristencmdoherty@gmail.com or explore more plays at www.kristendoherty.com.au.
Comments