(Un)Shakespearean Nightmares at The Playground Theatre

Dying once in a moment of sheer, passionate angst is one thing. Doing it for eight shows a week, on and off for over 400 years? Surely that would get just a little old. And what of the ones who never got to hold the spotlight once in all of that time? Whether one’s life was a comedy, a tragedy or scarcely worthy of comment, after a certain point one would have a bone to pick with the godlike string-puller upstairs, author of one’s every misfortune. This is the amusing jumping-off point for (Un)Shakespearean Nightmares, a new entry in The Playground Theatre’s Voila! Theatre Festival that supposes every last one of Shakespeare’s heroes, heroines and non-speaking parts are aware that they’re in a play, and fully fed up with their lot. Viola still finds she’s taken more seriously as Cesario, Rosaline and Caliban both want their spotlight, Romeo wants out, and Hamlet is, somehow, leaning more towards that “To be” option, if only he could get out of his obligations to the play that created him.

It’s an idea with seemingly limitless potential for affectionate meta-lampoonery, and the five performers (each alternating roles) are fully game for the job. There are jabs at Daniel Day-Lewis and James Corden, a slapstick routine centring the Three Weird Sisters, Caliban with a giant squid on his head and plenty of room for growth from there. It’s something of a pity, then, that (Un)Shakespearean Nightmares’ parodic core can feel so… confused? It’s more than fair enough to let such minor players as Julius Caesar’s itinerant soothsayer and the aforementioned Rosaline vent their discontent, and there are some good (if glib) laughs to be mined in the depiction of Juliet as an unholy terror in constant, psychotic pursuit of Romeo, or the Bard himself as the malevolent, money-grubbing god of his own creative realm, batting his creations this way and that to maximise profit. But therein lies one of the questions this largely harmless bit of mockery can’t help but inspire: just what did Juliet do to deserve it? For that matter, what did Shakespeare?

In the former’s case, one is bound to cast one’s mind back to original recipe Romeo and Juliet. Was it not Romeo, the senior of the two, who showed up at her balcony? And as for the latter, there is ample cause to target the Bard as an unashamed populist! Indeed, some of the most inspired sections in the play involve Shakespeare himself addressing the crowd to rattle off ad reads and promote branded items, to the point of seeming this close to belting the McDonald’s theme. Were he at work today, one can’t imagine him being wholly above that sort of thing, and there are some promising but half-formed swipes at the current corporate overlords in this characterisation. Still, every poison pen love letter must surely put love first and foremost, and thus be free and able to criticise its subject ceaselessly. When there’s only poison, one starts to question what is really being said on the subject.

As they launch their open rebellion against their most hateful creator, the discarded characters of Shakespeare realise one of the most powerful weapons in their arsenal is quotes from Shakespeare’s most prominent critics. Thus, eloquent damnations of the Bard as a shoddy, vapid dramatist (courtesy of Tolstoy) who produced an artistic failure in Hamlet (TS Eliot can claim that one) and reuses themes and archetypes are read aloud with relish, cumulatively producing an effect not dissimilar to when one combines the Wicked Witch of the West and a pail of water. Again, a funny idea, but it leaves a strange taste in the mouth. Perhaps the result is cathartic for those who suffered for the Bard’s art in their GCSEs and A-levels, but as a spoof it feels curiously lacking in warmth for its subject, even in much curiosity. One leaves almost tempted to mount a defence of the Bard, even fully knowing just how many opportunities one has had to get sick to death of him. He’s not all that bad!

Ultimately, this playful spoof is kept alive by a winsome anything-goes energy and a game cast, even if its conclusions on the Bard’s work can feel misplaced in their scorn. One maintains that a sharper, more encompassing version of this same material could yet be made.

Thomas Messner
Photo: Courtesy of The Playground Theatre

(Un)Shakespearean Nightmares is at The Playground Theatre from 7^th until 8^th November 2026. For further information or to book, visit the theatre’s website here.