“Original Practices” and Jonson's First Folio
Over the past twenty years or so, performance-based efforts to recreate the staging conditions and production modes of Elizabethan/Jacobean playhouses through “original practices” (OP) have developed at a considerable rate. One has only to note the popular appeal of theatre companies working from Early Modern architectural replicas (like London's Bankside Globe or Virginia's Blackfriars) to recognize the pervasive influence of the “reconstructive Shakespeare” movement on our understanding and interpretation of Renaissance drama. Yet, as the name would suggest, the movement is too often grounded in a performance aesthetic predicated solely on Shakespeare's playtexts (indeed, for many, the 1623 Folio is followed with a near religious fervor). But truth be told, other playwright/practitioners of the era have far more to say on the matter of staging verse drama than Shakespeare, and made a point of publishing their thoughts directly through prefatory material, commendatory verses, pamphlets, etc. Fletcher and Heywood immediately come to mind, but this paper will focus on the most prolific critic of the period, Ben Jonson. Not to be overshadowed by the numerous commemorations of Shakespeare's death, 2016 also marked the 400th anniversary of the publication of Jonson's landmark First Folio, and a brief review of his 1616 Workes should provide ample occasion to challenge several of the “original practices” championed by bardocentric theatre companies and their educational auxiliaries.