The Winter's Tale Archives - TheaterScene.net

The Winter’s Tale

August 12, 2026

Revivals today tend to come in several similar varieties: rewritten updates by famous contemporary playwrights, director projects that have high concepts, and entirely new plays inspired by the classics, often transposed to the present. It is a pleasure to report that director Daniel Sullivan’s riveting three hour and 20 minutes uncut production of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale for The Public Theater’s Free Shakespeare in the Park is a pure staging, gimmick and update free. Although there is not a weak link in the production, Lily Rabe’s Queen Hermione is so commanding and compelling that she elevates this usually overlooked role to another place in the Shakespeare canon. With a topnotch cast led by Raúl Esparza, Rabe, Chuck Cooper and Steven Skybell, the production features crystal clear sound design by Brian Ronan (sound system design by Mike Tracey) and impeccable diction by vocal and text coach Andrew Wade which makes this easy to follow and understand for both those who are seeing it for the first time and those who know the play. [more]

The Winter’s Tale (Bedlam)

October 21, 2022

Many of Bedlam’s productions have used small casts with most of the actors playing more than one role. In the case of "The Winter’s Tale," not one of Shakespeare’s more often produced plays, the casting uses so few actors that the play becomes confusing and difficult to follow, and a great many characters and much dialogue has necessarily been cut. In one head-scratching scene, Elan Zafir is required to play King Polixenes and his son Prince Florizel at the same time. While the sets and costumes are modern, with the Shakespeare poetry sacrificed to sound like contemporary speech, the characters are still referred to as “King Leontes” and his wife “Queen Hermione.” As the setting by John McDermott looks like three rooms in a frat house, one wonders why the Royal Family of Sicilia would be living in such shabby quarters and continually guzzling beer in the palace. [more]

The Winter’s Tale

February 27, 2015

"The Winter’s Tale" is classified as one of Shakespeare’s “problem plays” or “dark comedies” and as such it does not get produced very often. Under the direction of The Shakespeare Society’s Michael Sexton, The Pearl Theatre’s revival is elegant and entertaining. It solves some of the play’s problems while creating new ones. Surprisingly, the contemporary sets by Brett J. Banakis and costumes by Tilly Grimes work amazingly well for a tale told of the 16th century. [more]