Come and feel the magic - a world-famous play in an exciting ‘new’ venue, a tangible gem of Portsmouth history!

Come and feel the magic - a world-famous play in an exciting ‘new’ venue,

Stuart Williams, rehearsing as the mischievous Puck, Robin Goodfellow | Photo by Martin Willoughby.

placeholder image — Stuart Williams, rehearsing as the mischievous Puck, Robin Goodfellow | Photo by Martin Willoughby.

a tangible gem of Portsmouth history!

Demetrius (Jevan Fletcher) confronts Lysander (Lee Backhouse) | Martin Willoughby

For almost 80 years, the award-winning Southsea Shakespeare Actors have been performing the plays of the Bard (and many other writers) in the city and the wider area. And this summer, they are performing one of Shakespeare’s funniest and most popular comedies, A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

In the play you’ll meet lovers, fairies and ‘mechanicals’ (a group of ordinary working people trying their best to put on a play). It is a world full of laughter, love and magic. “But,” director Paula Bartlett says, “the world of the play also hints at something much darker. Beneath the romance and humour is a world where powerful, unpredictable forces of fairy magic interfere with human lives, and I wanted to explore that older folkloric vision of the fairies rather than the gentler, ‘cuter’ version”.

Assistant Director Jevan Fletcher explains further: “In Shakespeare’s England fairies were seen as something to be very wary of: unsettling, powerful, unpredictable beings whose attention could bring misfortune. This older tradition informs our portrayal of the fairies. These mischievous creatures of the wood play with mortal lives for their own amusement. And their fascination with human inventions is reflected in the steampunk aesthetic of our production.”

And what an exciting ‘new’ venue for the play: Treadgolds Warehouse, rarely, if ever, used as a theatre space before! Audiences will be stepping into one of the earliest surviving buildings in Portsea, dating back 300 years to the early 1700s. Treadgolds was an iron and steel merchants and general ironmonger’s shop.

Hermia (Erin Offord) in a pickle. | Martin Willoughby

The shopfront that visitors see today has remained unchanged since around 1870, making it one of the most authentic surviving Victorian shopfronts in Portsmouth. Paula says, “I wanted to put our play into a space that felt removed from everyday life: somewhere atmospheric, and capable of transformation. The industrial setting of Treadgolds reflects the working-world roots of the Mechanicals and complements our steampunk-inspired fairies, creating a world

where invention, magic, and mischief exist side by side.

I hope our audiences will enjoy visiting these chaotic, colliding worlds of the play as much as we have loved exploring them.”

The Southsea Shakespeare Actors will perform A Midsummer Night’s Dream on 5 evenings from Tuesday 14th to Saturday 18th July at 7.30 p.m. at Treadgolds, 1 Bishop Street, Portsea, PO1 3DA.