Stage and Film History of Cymbeline

• • 1611 - Earliest mention of performance of the play by someone named Simon Forman; indicated as an indoor performance (Dobson et al., The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare.)

  • 1634 - The next time the play was noted to be performed, at the court of Charles I and Henrietta Maria. (Dobson et al.)

  • 1746 - The original play returns to the stage after being displaced (Dobson et al.)

  • 1761 - David Garrick, an English playwright of the time, produced a version of the play that had minor edits, where he played the role of Posthumus. (Dowden, Cymbeline. The Arden Shakespeare, First Series.)

  • 1801 - John Philip Kemble’s company performs Cymbeline, with lavish sets and performances. (Dowden.)

  • 1837, 1865 - Imogen becomes a favorite heroine of Shakespeare, with specific performances by Helen Faucit (Dobson et al., The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare.)

  • 1859 - The first production of Cymbeline in Sri Lanka. (Wayne, Cymbeline: Patriotism and Performance.)

  • 1800s - The play is performed and produced several times in India, as well as Jamaica. (Wayne.)

  • 1932 - Performances at The Old Vic Theater, with successful performances from Peggy Ashcroft; despite this, the play begins to fall out of favor. (Dobson et al., The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare.)

  • 1956 - Performances that lean heavily into the fairy tale aspect of production by Peter Hall (Dobson et al.)

  • 1974 - John Barton attempts a production that connects Cymbeline to the British Oil Crisis (Dobson et al.)

  • 1994 - Ajay Chowdhury puts on a production based in India during British Rule (Wayne, Cymbeline: Patriotism and Performance.)

  • 2004 - The Hudson Shakespeare Company performs one of their two productions of the play; this production focuses on the fairy tale aspect of Cymbeline, like Peter Hall (http://hudsonshakespeare.org/venues/Venue%20Pages/2004/cymbeline%20at%20long%20pond.htm)

  • 2012 - The South Sudan Shakespeare Company puts on a Juba-Arabic production of the play for the Shakespeare’s Globe “Globe to Globe Festival” (https://www.cnn.com/2012/01/12/world/africa/shakespeare-south-sudan/index.html)

  • 2014 - The second Hudson Shakespeare Company production of Cymbeline, focusing more on the American Old West as it’s setting. (http://hudsonshakespeare.org/venues/Venue%20Pages/2004/cymbeline%20at%20long%20pond.htm)

  • 2021 - Shakespeare In Yosemite works on a production of Cymbeline in Yosemite, in partnership with Cymbeline in the Anthropocene; the focus is on the climate crisis. (https://www.cymbeline-anthropocene.com/#:~:text=Cymbeline%20in%20the%20Anthropocene%20is,tragi%2Dcomic%20romance%2C%20Cymbeline.)

Bibliography

Dobson, Michael, Stanley Wells, Will Sharpe, and Erin Sullivan, eds. The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare. Second edition. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2015.

Dowden, Edward. Cymbeline. The Arden Shakespeare, First Series, 1903.

Wayne, Valerie. Cymbeline: Patriotism and Performance. A Companion to Shakespeare’s Works. Wiley Online Books, 2005. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470996560.ch21.