Photos: First Look at A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM at Stratford Festival

Spellbound lovers, quarrelling fairies, tradesmen with a fervour for amateur theatricals: they're all mixed up together in the surreal world of Shakespeare's great comedy of dreaming and desire.

This deep dive into the sometimes unsettlingly dark and dangerous realms of the subconscious famously culminates in a play within the play: a hilariously inept performance by Nick Bottom and his fellow would-be actors. But even as we laugh at the ham-fisted efforts of these "rude mechanicals," we are won over by their heartfelt belief in the power of the imagination.

Taking its cue from that insight, this production deploys the most fundamental techniques of theatrical art in a magically inventive staging of a play that is itself a celebration of the imagination at its most extreme.

Learn more here.

Photo Credit: David Hou.

The Company of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM

Eva Foote

Stratford Festival 2021 Mid Summer Night's Dream

The Company of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM

Bahareh Yaraghi, Trish Lindström

Amaka Umeh

Trish Lindström

André Sills

Amaka Umeh, Micah Woods, Jonathan Mason, and Eva Foote

Eva Foote and Micah Woods

Bahareh Yaraghi

Craig Lauzon, Trish Lindström

Eva Foote, Micah Woods, and Trish Lindström

Craig Lauzon, Trish Lindström

Jonathan Mason