The vibrant and colourful woods of Athens are brought to life in this vivid adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The new production, directed by Birmingham Rep artistic directors Joe Murphy and Madeline Kludje, is a fun and bright show that is overall very enjoyable. A great performance was given by the whole cast, who occasionally move around within the audience, bringing us all into the dream with them. Despite this, some of the musical numbers ended up being slightly alienating and the brief climate change plotline that ran alongside Theseus’ and Hippolyta’s story felt bookended and forced.

The vibrant and colourful woods of Athens are brought to life

This adaptation of the classic Shakespeare play retains much of the original language with a few modern updates. On the eve of Theseus and Hippolyta’s wedding, young lovers Hermia and Lysandra (one of the well-executed instances of gender swap in the play) elope into the Athenian woods pursued by Demetrius and Helena. Meanwhile, a troop of players meet in the woods to rehearse a play for the wedding by night. Unbeknownst to the mortals, the Fairy King Oberon and Queen Titania are fighting and with the help of the mischievous Puck, chaos ensues in the woods.

What really caught my eye was the staging. What was initially an austere and militaristic stone palace is transformed into a colourful forest. The tall columns are spun around to reveal glass cases of real foliage and pink flowers donated by the Sutton Park Rangers team. With the strip lights framing the cases, the effect was beautiful and added a colourful dimension to the action. The contrast between the grey columns and the pink and green forest did create the dreamy and otherworldly quality, the designer was no doubt aiming for, to great effect.

Dreamy and otherworldly quality

The whole cast as an ensemble were excellent, particularly the dynamics between the four young lovers. Every scene they were in was hilarious and engaging, with Helena (played by newcomer Charlotte Wallis) standing out in her expertly delivered monologues and witty retorts. The company of players too were hilarious, but the show was stolen by Omar Malik’s performance as Nick Bottom. His comedic
performance had the audience in stitches, his overblown arrogance was very effective and his delivery was perfect. In fact, the whole performance of Pyramus and Thisbe at the end had a ‘The Play that Goes Wrong’ quality to it that was well done and hilarious. The back-and-forths between himself and Hannah McPake’s Peter Quince were some of the highlights of the show.

In fact, Malik’s participations were some of the only aspects of the songs that felt natural in the show. This may be due to how comedically bad they were (on purpose), but the other songs, such as Puck’s entrance singing ‘Sweet Dreams’, felt a little jarring. The monologue’s performed as songs were best of the musical numbers, particularly Puck’s ‘Up and Down’. However, other monologues, such as the finale, with the exception of the choral section, fell a bit flat. At the risk of sounding like a Shakespeare purist, the songs felt out of place and gratuitous on the whole.

This was similarly felt with some of the modernisations. Some were well integrated, such as Puck’s fourth wall break and moments with the young lovers (I cackled when Demetrius hit his vape mid-argument). I feel this was because of their roles however: Puck is a law unto themselves and the young lovers were dressed in school uniform to highlight their modernity. Elsewhere, the modernisations were less well executed. I felt the audience physically cringe at a 67 joke that felt incredibly unnecessary. The modernisations weren’t totally unwelcome but some felt a little strange.

Other songs […] felt a little jarring

The play opens with a climate change report delivered by Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons. It appears that as a result of this, a loveless political marriage is constructed between Hippolyta and Theseus, King of Athens. This aspect of the play felt clunky, as the climate change theme is forgotten until a brief scene at the end of the play. Furthermore, there was no development of the romance between the King and Queen but upon their return in Act 2, they seem to be madly in love, with Hippolyta having hated Theseus the last time we saw them. Nevertheless, the roles of the mortal and fairy King and Queen being the same actors was incredibly effective and their costumes were distinctive and excellent.

The costumes throughout the whole play, in fact, were incredible. The fairies were beautiful and whimsical, their designs having come from an open competition earlier this year, and Cobweb’s costume stood out to me as especially well constructed. Puck’s costume was reminiscent of a drag look and worked incredibly well, especially the mime-like white face paint in contrast with Carver’s other character of Philostrate.

Overall, an excellent adaptation of the Shakespeare play commanded by an incredibly talented cast. The plotlines and moments that missed tended to be those that were added on top of the original material. However, the performance of the Shakespearean language felt accessible and well-performed and I enjoyed it overall. Act 1 in particular was brilliant and well worth a watch.

Rating: 3/5 stars

A Midsummer Night’s Dream plays at the Birmingham Rep till Sunday, 24 May 2026. Tickets can be bought here.

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