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by William Shakespeare, directed by Graham Abbey

Stratford Festival, Festival Theatre, Stratford

May 27–September 26, 2026

Theseus: “Is there no play / To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?”

The Stratford festival’s sixth production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream since 2000 commits that far too familiar crime of trying to make a classic comedy funnier. Initially, it seems as if director Graham Abbey is going to take a darker view of the play than is common. However, once we get into the central scenes of the four lovers in the Athenian forest, we wind up with the usual aimless shouting and running about. Normally, the Mechanicals’ play at the end is the show’s highpoint. Here, it is so drawn out its energy dissipates.

In Shakespeare the fairies Oberon and Titania argue over who should take charge of a changeling boy (in this production, a girl). Titania argues right of possession because the mortal woman who gave birth to the child was one of her votresses and died in childbirth. Director Graham Abbey has decided that these events should be shown and depicts them on stage before the starts of main action. The images of death and birth give the play a much more serious edge than expected in a comedy.

Abbey continues this serious tone with the first scene of the play. In this production the court of Theseus and Hippolyta is holding a ball that is suddenly interrupted by the entry of Egeus. This scene, not comic in Shakespeare, is heightened by Egeus’ disrupting a dance, symbolic in Shakespeare of social harmony. If Hermia does not marry Demetrius instead of Lysander, whom she loves, Hermia faces a choice of death or eternal seclusion in a convent. Hermia and Lysander flee the court and Demetrius, who loves Hermia, and Helena, who loves Demetrius, follow them.

Lorenzo Savoini’s set for the forest consists of a huge fallen tree trunk and a smaller truck nearby. The dominant feature is a large sphere which, under Normal Studio’s projection design, most often represents the moon, one of the main images in the text. The projections beamed from above also cover the entire thrust stage of the Tom Patterson Theatre. Initially, they represent rather oddly waves of water as if the tree trunks were being washed ashore (in the midst of a forest?). Then they become a mossy forest floor.

Most productions of MND omit a passage from the first argument between Oberon and Titania. Titania states that “thorough this distemperature we see / The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts / Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose”. As Titania says this, the projections show ice forming all over the stage floor. In a score of Dreams this is only the second time I’ve seen a director include and pay attention to these lines.

The first time was Michael Boyd’s production for the RSC in 1999. He realized that despite the title if the seasons have altered as Tatania says the action really takes place in winter. Thus, all the characters were clad for winter until the ending restored summer again and the seasons returned to their normal course.

Abbey obviously recognizes that the seasons have altered, but unfortunately, he does not follow through on what this means. We may see ice forming while Titania speaks but once the lovers enter the forest, we are back to the mossy forest floor again. As is customary in MND, the lovers gradually shed clothing as the action progresses, even though, if the seasons have altered, this makes no sense.

A further inconsistency is that the projections on the sphere do not always represent the moon. Occasionally, the moon reflects events on stage as when it shows a close-up of the magic flower that causes its victims to fall in love with the first person they see. Another time, Puck’s face occupies the whole globe when Lysander and Demetrius cannot discern where a voice is coming from. Just because a projection effect is possible doesn’t mean a director should use it. In both these cases, the sudden change in the moon to something else, attracts attention away from the stage.

Among the fairies, André Sills is a commanding Oberon and Sara Topham an elegant Titania, just as one would wish. The casting of Mike Nadajewski as Puck gives that character quite a different quality than usual. A mocking, sneering tone seems to be part of Nadajewski’s natural mode of expression. His Puck is not the obedient servant sprite that Ariel is to Prospero in The Tempest. His is a Puck, who is basically insolent and unwilling to accept blame or censure. Abbey has Nadajewski speak directly to the audience which makes his Puck seem like an updated version of the medieval Vice figure. Before Act 2 begins, Abbey has Nadajewski sit on stage and play games with the audience, thus breaking down any barriers between the audience and the stage. It’s a bit of fun but irrelevant to the play.

Among members of the court, Evan Buliung makes Theseus a much more vivid character than usual. Buliung’s careful method of elucidating Shakespeare’s poetry reveals Theseus not just as a conqueror but as a thoughtful man. This goes a long way toward explaining how a former enemy like Hippolyta could consider him worthy to be her husband. For her part Ijeoma Emesowum makes Hippolyta a dignified woman, once a warrior, now content to lead a quieter life and equally content to check any remarks of Theseus she disagrees with. Tim Campbell’s Egeus is so wrathful the figure is in danger of becoming a caricature. Abbey’s idea of having Egeus reconcile with Lysander at the end is excellent, but one wishes it lasted more than a single moment.

Of the young lovers, Thomas Duplessie as Demetrius stands out as the one the most able to convey with clarity the meaning of his lines and the least inclined to shout. Next best is Jessica B. Hill as Helena. Hill has a pleasant voice but under pressure it becomes rough and hoarse. Abbey makes Helena the one character besides Puck who directly addresses the audience. This has the beneficial effect of causing the audience to listen more carefully to what Helena says. With a knack for emphasizing key words, Hill reveals Helena as the most complex of the four lovers. On the one hand she is a proto-feminist, able to see through the men’s unthinking attitudes towards women. On the other hand, Helena is desperately in love with Demetrius, despite his current preference for Hermia. Hill more successfully than other Helenas I’ve seen highlights this intriguing interior conflict in the character.

Jordin Hall as Lysander and Vivien Endicott-Douglas as Hermia do nothing useful to make their characters interesting. Costume designer Joshua Quinlan has set the action in the late 19th century when puffed sleeves were popular for women and men could wear capes as part of evening dress. Why Abbey allows Lysander a ukulele, which first became popular in the 1920s is a mystery. Even less understandable is why Abbey allow him gestures from the present day and song stylings from the 1940s. Endicott-Douglas, who has a long list of fine credits, does nothing but shout her lines from start to finish. At first, I thought she was attempting to make Hermia seem an over-dramatic character. Soon enough I realized that Endicott-Douglas was being over-dramatic.

Quite often the only characters an audience really likes in MND are the group known as the Mechanicals, so named because they ply various trades. Their desire to stage a play for the wedding of Theseus and Hippolyta is a loving satire of amateur theatrics. For this production, Abbey has changed the group’s leader from Peter Quince to Rita Quince. Given the updated setting, having a woman as director of a theatrical troupe is eminently believable. Sarah Dodd lends Quince a delightful schoolmarmishness that perfectly suits the character’s pedantic nature.

In this production the Mechanicals’ rehearsals in the forest are the funniest sequences in the play. Michael Spencer-Davis is especially good as Nick Bottom who wants to play all the roles. The Francis Flute of Aaron Krohn amusingly admires Bottom’s efforts while the tough Snout of Sara-Jeanne Hosie could care less. Michael Man is the shy Robin Starveling and the Snug of Steven Hao 郝邦宇 is just happy that Quince has found a part for him.

Usually, these rehearsals lead to the highpoint of the play, the Mechanical’s performance of the “lamentable comedy” of Pyramus and Thisbe. Sadly, this is not the case in this production. Knowing how much audiences love this scene, Abbey has made the terrible decision to lengthen it by adding “funny bits” not in the original. He has the fastidious Starveling playing the Moon repeat his few lines at least four times because Starveling hates being interrupted. He has Snug as the Lion enter and depart by performing a weird semi-balletic dance. His worst idea is to have Bottom playing Pyramus accidentally knock Snout playing the Wall unconscious leaving Bottom and Flute confused about how to perform their scene. Abbey has Pyramus make more fuss over the fallen Wall than he does over committing suicide.

In fact, Abbey’s slow pacing of the play and a large number of interpolated scenes drag out the running time of Shakespeare’s third-shortest comedy to three hours, at least half an hour too long. Interesting as it is, we don’t need to see the death in childbirth of Titania’s votress unless Abbey is going to make a special point about it. We don’t need to see the Mechanicals hold a séance to locate the missing Bottom when all the text has him do is enter. And we certainly don’t need a whole production number to sing Titania to sleep, especially when she is awake for the would-be lullaby and sings along with it.

So far, the best MND at Stratford this century is the production directed by Chris Abraham in 2014. Abraham set the action in Stratford in 2014 where neighbours were staging Shakespeare’s play to celebrate the wedding of two locals. The way that ordinary people went about fashioning costumes and props from everyday items to play everything from human rulers to fairies was absolutely delightful. In contrast to that lovely home-made approach, an unpleasant aspect of the current production is a reliance on projections to create magic. If I go to the theatre, I would like to see magic created by theatrical means. If I want to see projections for special effects, I’ll watch a movie.

Christopher Hoile

Photos: Sara Topham as Titania and Michael Spencer-Davis as Bottom; Jordin Hall as Lysander, Vivien Endicott-Douglas as Hermia and Thomas Duplessie as Demetrius; Mike Nadajewski as Puck; Aaron Krohn as Flute, Sarah Dodd as Rita Quince, Sara-Jeanne Hosie as Snout, Michael Man as Starveling and Steven Hao 郝邦宇 (seated on floor) as Snug. © 2026 David Hou.

For tickets visit: www.stratfordfestival.ca