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Yes, he did in many.Though we are not sure which ones.
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Devin
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FranWilliam Shakespeare had a stake holding in the Globe Theatre and also acted in some of the productions of the plays. It is not known exactly how many roles Shakespeare played himself, although we do have some documented information. Shakespeare had began his career on the stage by 1592, because there is a surviving document by Robert Greene' Groatsworth. It is probable that Shakespeare played the title role in Edward I (a play by Edward Peele) in 1593. It is also assumed that Shakespeare played smaller roles in a variety of his own plays, including As You Like It (Adam), Macbeth (King Duncan), Henry IV (King Henry), and Hamlet (Hamlet's father). Shakespeare's first biographer, Nicholas Rowe, referring to a role by William Shakespeare as "the Ghost in his own Hamlet" and was "the top of his performance".
The First Folio explicitly states that Shakespeare was one of the actors who performed in his plays, but does not make clear which roles or which plays.
William Shakespeare was a member of, and part owner, of an acting company called The Lord Camberlain's Men, which later became The King's Men. As well as writing, and managing The Globe Theatre which was owned by his acting company, he performed in his own plays and plays by other writers.
He certainly did not produce them. Production was done by committee, by the sharers in the company, of which Shakespeare was only one. Most of the actual production legwork was probably done by the company business manager, Richard Burbage's brother Cuthbert.
As for directing, we really have no idea how Elizabethan plays were directed. It is hard to visualize Shakespeare telling Richard Burbage how to play his part. It's easier to imaging Burbage directing Shakespeare. However, it is also quite possible that there was no director at all, and the actors directed themselves in their parts. Perhaps someone had the job of co-ordinating the action with the musicians and stagehands. But we have no reason to believe that Shakespeare as opposed to any other member of the company had that or any other directorial job.
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Did Shakespeare perform in any other plays than his own?
Yes, we know that he performed in two plays of Ben Jonson's, Sejanus and Every Man Out of his Humour.
Did William shakespeare write his own plays and poems?
Yes.
Welldid shakespeare write the plays published under his name?
Rumor is Shakespeare did not write his own plays published under his name they say he had help writing them.
Did William shakespeare just perform his plays or did he write them as well?
He wrote his own plays and sometimes performed in those plays
Did William Shakespeare publish his sonnets?
Some people say that he did, some people say not. But the pure evidence is unknown, like Shakespeare's life himself, he was very private so we don't have alot of evidence to say. It's unlikely that Shakespeare himself had any of his own plays published for the simple fact that it was expensive and there would have been no reason to. People didn't publish things back then unless there was a strong market for something, particularly playwrights - publishing a play meant that it could be performed without you. Plays generally weren't extensively read or printed back then, they existed mostly as performance. It was only people who had a real passion for theatre that would buy a printed play in quarto or octavo form. Shakespeare's first folio was only the second time an English playwright had his plays published in folio (the most expensive way to print) ever - and that was after he was dead. Publishing was a VERY expensive and time consuming process. Some of the earlier quartos (the "bad" quartos) that were printed are, in many opinions, constructed from the memories of actors who performed in Shakespeare's plays. They were printed so that the plays could be taken out with acting troupes who were forced to ply their trade abroad when the theatres closed due to plague. Most of Shakespeare's plays were published for the first time in 1623 when William Jaggard and Edward Blount managed to get the rights (there were copyrights of sorts back then, though they mostly applied to the ownership of the manuscripts at that point) and the help of those who knew and worked with Shakespeare. They were only published after it was clear that Shakespeare would remain a legend after his death.
