Research in Action: Staging Mass in Early Modern Drama – Catholic Performance Culture in Early Modern England

All are welcome to join us for a research-in-action workshop at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse in London on 12 June 2024. During the event, hosted by Dr Will Tosh, I will be joined by Professor Alison Shell and Fr Ryan Service to discuss the intricate relationship between Catholic liturgy and theatre in post-Reformation England.

The evening event, which is open to the public, will include script-in-hand performances of several excerpts from plays written for commercial playhouses and from The History of Purgatory, a unique Catholic vernacular drama written in early seventeenth-century. This will be a fantastic opportunity to witness Catholic drama that has remained unperformed for centuries and to help us reconsider the role of drama within the persecuted Catholic community in England and, more broadly, the tensions between religious ritual and early modern playhouse.