Richard Main 

Directed by Alec Fellows-Bennett

This fabulous play, filled with its comical characters and wonderful relationships, is predominantly set in a wood outside Athens, thus lending itself perfectly to performance in the open-air. With picturesque surroundings, beautiful fairies, fauns and elves, plus a little midsummer magic, this play will (I hope) delight people young and old. When directing 'The Dream' you realise very early on that Shakespeare has given you all you need to create magic. From the complexity of the characters, their relationships with one another and the beautiful poetry of the language, it is the easiest job in the world to bring this complete world to the stage.

AFB 27/5/05

'The most insipid ridiculous play that I ever saw in my life'
Samuel Pepys, 1662

''Midsummer' was a feast to the soul'
Vivienne Sillar & Holly Bell, bbc.co.uk

'A fantastic performance by a truly fantastic theatre company'
Jill Mellor, Roscommon Champion

Directed by Philip Stevens

 I have worked on Romeo and Juliet, in numerous guises, more than on any other play. An accident as it happens, but one which has taught me to love the work more than any other. With familiarity sometimes comes lethargy, but I challenge anyone not to have the senses assaulted by the sheer joy, passion and relentless sorrow that comes with the thought of death in love.
 I suspect that the continual popularity of Romeo and Juliet rises not simply from a story of young love, but because it haunts us all that the love we have to give is now more than ever not eternal however much we long it to be.

PS

'By the interval, the audience was beginning to resemble a refugee camp with shoulders draped in blankets and hands clasped around mugs of coffee...a magical and elemental experience'
Martin Worth, bbc.co.uk

'stunning scenery and amazing acting is a match made in heaven...HHHH'
Zhang-Lei Wang, Post Gazette and Advertiser

Directed by Philip Stevens

Macbeth is one of Shakespeare's most emotionally upsetting plays. It deals with a hero, that is not only flawed but evil. His naked greed and ambition are ugly and extreme, but easy for an audience to comprehend. The play exposes and explores the darkness of human nature, the thoughts that are not spoken and actions that should never take place.
   I have tried to draw on both the historical and religious nature of the play. There are many rich influences from the Dark Ages, which drive the imagination, from the tales of Arthur to the adversity of Alfred. In this production of Macbeth, I hope to bring the tale closer to its historical roots, retaining the moral messages with which Shakespeare has filled the text.

PS

Directed by Simon James Green

  Even when the Shrew was first performed, the anachronistic view of marriage that it represents was already out of date. Kate's offer to place her hand beneath her husband's foot was a gesture inspired by a pert of the wedding ceremony that had been prohibited 40 years before Shakespeare wrote the play.
  Shifting the story to the 19th Century we see the 'Woman Question' gaining prominence, and drastically upsetting the accepted gender roles. The notion of 'taming the shrew' became problematic. Oscar Wilde summarised this shift in gender roles: 'In an age when woman was a mere chattel, Katherine's degrading speech about "Thy husband is thy lord..." might have passed with an audience of bullies. But imagine a parcel of gentlemen in the stalls of the Gaiety Theatre, half of them perhaps living idly on their wives incomes, grinning complacently through it as if it were true or even honourably romantic.'
   However, given what we see of Kate and Petruchio through the play, and the way their relationship changes and deepens, it is hard to believe that Shakespeare's ending is as simple as it seems. Perhaps part of its solution lies in the Induction to the play - something left out of many productions.
   The Induction establishes a framework of identity-questioning, metamorphosis and masquerade which crucially changes the meaning of everything that follows. When Sly becomes a lord - simply because he is persuaded that he is one, and the pageboy is made his lady, appearance becomes reality, metamorphosis rules and the world is turned upside down before our eyes. Many critics have argued that this self-conscious theatricality (the drawing of attention to the boy actor playing Bartholomew and the players who provide the entertainment) indicates that Shakespeare wishes to undermine the validity of the wife taming that occurs: is everything we see an illusion?

SJG. London, April 2005

'rip-roaring performances'
Adam Civico, Barnsley Chronicle

'winning formula of love, comedy and passion'
Amy De-Keyzer, bbc.co.uk

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