A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Cambridge University Pembroke Players Japan Tour 2008

Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' is his most magical and most perfect comedy. It is colourful, spontaneous, poetic, hilariously funny, teasingly sinister, and satisfyingly cyclic.

Our production is set in Victorian Britain. This is based on two modern-day preconceptions of what this famous age was like, which correspond neatly to Shakespeare's Grecian settings. Athens is upper-class nineteenth-century London: It is grey, angular, sensible, mannered, adult. Theseus's court is like a Victorian drawing room, with piles of neatly arranged books, where 'children should be seen and not heard' and the judgement of the father is final.

The Athenian Wood is the rest of London - the Victorian Labyrinth in Technicolour. The darker, more subversive, more alive, more dangerously spontaneous atmosphere of a Dickensian metropolis meets an exotic jungle, an endless wood full of surprises.

With a cast of eleven, and minimalist design coupled with music and dance, The Pembroke Players' production promises to be a dynamic and exciting revival of Shakespeare's classic.


The tour is visiting around Japan from 14 Sept to 3 Oct, and performing mainly at educational institutions. Most venues are free, and some are open to public as follows.

2008/9/20 Sat 13:30- Seikei Gakuen, Tokyo
2008/9/22 Mon 18:00- Himeji Caspa Hall, Himeji Dokkyo Univ., Hyogo
2008/9/28 Sun 15:00- Hato no Ie, Sendai, Miyagi (tickets from 1000 yen)
2008/9/30 Tue 17:30- Kyoritsu Hall, Kyoritsu Women’s Univ., Tokyo
2008/10/1 Wed 18:30- Daito Bunka Univ., Takashimadaira, Tokyo (advance-booking required)

For more details, please visit our website at:
Official website: http://www.srcf.ucam.org/pemplayers/japantour/
Official blog: http://cuppjt.jugem.jp/
Or join our mixi community: http://mixi.jp/view_community.pl?id=3146003

Why not join us and enjoy “Shakespeare on the other side of the Globe”??


Extra - our last year's production: Romeo and Juliet