Skip to footer

Shakespeare's sonnets serve as the basis for short films

The Sonnet Project, created by the New York Shakespeare Exchange, finds 154 of the Bard's sonnets inspiring movies.

|
Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP
Actress Carrie Preston is one of the people who participated in the films made by the Sonnet Project.
  • By Molly Driscoll Staff Writer

The works of Shakespeare have been put on film many – many – times before. But now some of the writer’s sonnets are the basis of new movies.

According to The New York Times, the Sonnet Project came from the New York Shakespeare Exchange. Through the project, the NYSE are trying to make a movie for each of Shakespeare’s 154 sonnets. They’re currently at number 100. 

Actors who have participated include Carrie Preston of “The Good Wife” and Billy Magnussen, who recently starred in “Into the Woods.”

The movies are posted via YouTube on the Sonnet Project website.

“We’re always looking for new ways to reach audiences that go beyond the restrictions of a live performance in a small theater,” Ross Williams, who is the artistic director for the NYSE and for the Sonnet Project, told the NYT.

Check out the Sonnet Project website here.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Shakespeare's sonnets serve as the basis for short films
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2015/0406/Shakespeare-s-sonnets-serve-as-the-basis-for-short-films
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe