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Shakespeare in Prison Director Sophia Esch joined Marie Osborne on Michigan Voices to discuss the impact of Shakespeare in Prison and its collaboration with Wayne State University’s production of Julius Caesar.

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Frannie Shepherd-Bates a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Today we’d like to introduce you to Frannie Shepherd-Bates.

Written and directed by Sarah Shourd, who was once held as a political prisoner in Iran, and with many of its cast and crew survivors of solitary confinement, “The Box” sheds light on a concerning corner of incarceration in the U.S.

“Honestly, at first, a guy like me would get teased doing something like that,” Gabriel Odlum, a returning citizen, says of performing in a Shakespeare in Prison program. “But it was empowering to know, regardless of where you’re at, that type of stuff is valued. Through it, we found out who we were, and what our strengths were.”

Most, if not all, of us know who William Shakespeare is, or at the very least we know something that he has written. His work has had an impact on the lives of many people throughout centuries of time. But did he ever think his work would be used to inspire, empower, and heal incarcerated people in the 21st century?

Frannie Shepherd-Bates founded Shakespeare in Prison in 2012. Nine years later, SIP is the signature community program of the Detroit Public Theatre and has worked on a total of eight plays with a women’s ensemble at Huron Valley Correctional Facility and a men’s ensemble at Parnall Correctional Facility.

When a member of the men’s ensemble suggested that SIP should find a way to share their work to make it easier for others to approach, his idea inspired a new project: a planned critical edition of Richard III that pairs Shakespeare’s text with the ideas and perspectives of incarcerated women who worked with the play over the course of 2016 and 2017.

When a theater professional with a commitment to social justice sets her sights on bringing Shakespeare to incarcerated people, the result is Frannie Shepherd-Bates’ remarkable Shakespeare in Prison program.

With in-person access to Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility cut off since March, organizers are mailing activity packs to offer prisoners a continuing connection to the program, the community, and themselves.