On Sunday, December 20, Radio Theater presents "Christmas Eve at the Mermaid Tavern."
It's Christmas Eve, 1597 in the favorite haunt of impecunious Elizatethan playwrights and actors -- The Mermaid Tavern. This delightful sketch, written by David Dodge and Loyal McClaren in the 1930s, portrays William Shakespeare, Richard Burbage, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Ben Jonson on Christmas Eve, 1597. While the tavern owner's wife Jenny fills their tankards with ale they come up with a scheme to get some money so they can start the New Year off with a clean slate. They'll write a holiday ballad and serenade the Queen on Christmas Eve.