Reviews and feedback

The Value of the Project

To some extent, of course, the value of the project is for others to decide. However, it is perhaps permissible for those who have been involved over a number of years to offer their opinions.

The work of Edward’s Boys has provided opportunities for:

1. The academics, for whom it offers occasional insights into what it might have been like to witness a performance by a boys’ company

2. The development of a company spirit and the inculcation of apprenticeship which has been a crucial element in the success of the endeavour

3. The development of skills as performers of early modern drama

4. Wider educational value, which has been immeasurable – within the school community in a pastoral sense, in terms of an emotional and PSHE education, a curriculum useful for boys, and an appreciation of the power of the arts

Reviews

Review of A Chaste Maid in Cheapside by Professor John Jowett, The Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham

Review of A Mad World My Masters by Professor Laurie Maguire, Magdalen College, Oxford

Review of Antonio’s Revenge by Dr Lucy Munro, University of Keele

Review of Endymion by Professor Leah Scragg, University of Manchester

Review of The Dutch Courtesan by Professor Jonathan Bate, University of Oxford

Review of Westward Ho! by Professor Elisabeth Dutton, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

Click here to read more expert opinion on the work of Edward’s Boys from Pascale Aebischer, Gregory Doran, Tiffany Stern, Laurie Maguire, Gordon McMullan and Elisabeth Dutton.

Shopping Basket
Edward’s Boys show us what boys’ companies can do — which is to say, anything. Their productions are not excellent ‘for children’ or ‘for amateurs’ – they are excellent by any standards. They draw energy from two vital sources: first, painstaking attention to the text, which enables each actor to understand his lines and communicate clearly with the audience; second, the ensemble ethos of the boys and their director, Perry Mills. Mills has created a culture in which the boys teach and learn f…
Professor Elisabeth Dutton, University, FribourgSwitzerland
I can honestly say that I had never imagined I would ever see a production that came so near to recapturing what it must have been like to see the plays as they were intended to be performed, or that would shed so much light on how much could be expected of juvenile performers.
Professor Leah Scragg, UniversityManchester
Anyone interested in early modern theatre should see an Edward’s Boys’ production. Their exploration of the repertory written for the Boys’ Companies may not be for the faint-hearted. The closed-minded will side with the anti-theatrical pamphleteers and declare that disguise is indeed a wickedness. The open-hearted will relish their performances as a revelation.
Patrick Spottiswoode, Director, Globe EducationShakespeare’s Globe
Perry Mills and his boys are fast becoming the stuff of legend. A cut above your average drama society, Edward’s Boys are currently ploughing their way through the dramatic canon of the early modern childrens’ companies… we were given a consummately professional and finely-realised production of a very rarely-performed play. It’ll be fascinating to see where the boys take us next.
Dr. Peter Kirwan, UniversityNottingham
Edward’s Boys never fail to delight with their always lively and committed performances of plays by Shakespeare’s contemporaries. Avoiding theatrical archaeology, they nevertheless offer deeply suggestive insights into the practices of the all-boys’ companies that performed both comedies and tragedies – too often neglected by our professional theatre – by writers such as John Lyly, Thomas Middleton and John Marston.
Professor Stanley Wells, CBE, University, BirminghamPresident Shakespeare Birthplace Trust
More than any other theatre company, including the best of the professionals, Edward’s Boys are in the vanguard of exploring the theatrical style of Thomas Middleton and other contemporaries of Shakespeare… They are clearly leading the way in the exploration of early modern plays using an all-boys cast. Those of us privileged to see these productions are learning about a key aspect of the production of plays in Shakespeare’s period. We are also seeing excellent productions of plays that are insu…
Professor John Jowett, The Shakespeare Institute, UniversityBirmingham
Those who were privileged to see the little eyases of KES playing The Dutch Courtesan will really understand what Shakespeare was talking about: the common stagers in the Courtyard behind the new science block have good cause to be rattled.
Professor Jonathan Bate, UniversityOxford
Edward’s Boys’ revivals of plays by the likes of Lyly, Middleton and Marston have informed and transformed my thinking about early modern drama and children’s company plays in particular. No modern revivals can give us concrete answers to our questions about the plays or their performance style, but over the last few years Perry MIlls’ lucid and imaginative productions have asked the very best kinds of questions.
Dr Lucy Munro, UniversityKeele
Edward’s Boys are a revelation. Anyone who is interested in early modern plays in performance ought to see them. In terms of physicality, proxemics and embodiment, they open up new theatrical horizons for even the most experienced twenty first century theatre goer; they challenge complacency about theatrical norms; they are also extremely entertaining.
Dr Elizabeth SchaferRoyal Holloway College London
You’re currently the world’s leading authorities on the performance of Middleton’s boys’ plays.
Professor Carol Chillington Rutter, UniversityWarwick
Contact us

Perry Mills

King Edward VI School,
Church Street,
Stratford-upon-Avon
CV37 6HB

Email: pem@kes.net

Telephone: 01789 293351
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