RSC actors to brush up on their Shakespeare

Royal Shakespeare Company actors will be going back to school for master classes in performance with the University of Warwick as a part of a new theater study center.

The Higher Education Funding Council for England awarded $8.5 million to enable the world-famous theater to join the university to create a learning center for students, the teaching staff and the professional actors, it was announced Thursday.

The new center will be called CAPITAL (Creativity and Performance in Teaching and Learning) and will create various programs associated with theatrical performance.

The new additions include an international playwright in residence program, a professor of creativity and performance, computer 3D modeling of performance spaces, training for the Royal Shakespeare Company actors, online educational materials for public use and new studio space on campus and in Stratford-upon-Avon, the bard’s hometown.

The initiative will also see workshops developed with the National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth, based at the university, and online educational materials shared for public use.

“This is a great marriage,” said Michael Boyd, the Royal Shakespeare Company’s artistic director. “When a theater company like the RSC and a university with Warwick’s resources collaborate, the partnership is worth much more than the sum of its parts.

“If our ambition at the RSC is for a place where artists can learn and make theater at the same time, then this project is a valuable part of our journey to that goal.”