Originally published in 1600, Shakespeare's beloved comedy, A Midsummer Night's Dream, was written in the same century that a devastating epidemic would take hold of Europe: the Bubonic Plague. Live theatres were shut down beginning in the late 16th and through early 17th centuries, but Shakespeare continued to write many plays despite these closures.

These "Plague Plays" served as a form of entertainment for the common folk of London, meant to lift spirits and make them forget about the realities of their daily hardships. Not too unlike today with the COVID-19 Pandemic, Chapman University's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream serves to bring the power of live theatre back to the Orange community.

Director Tom Bradac directed Tartuffe 20 years ago at Chapman University around the time of the September 11 attacks. He mentioned how the event was traumatizing for everyone, including himself, but he still had to go to class and teach students, his passion for this art form not stopping him nor others from creating art.

Bradac fondly spoke of the production: “At times like these we needed to laugh, we needed art, we needed community. I think it's the same thing now. We need life, we need each other because we've been so isolated. It's ironic that that happened 20 years ago."

The act of live theatre is no stranger to plagues and infectious diseases. Shakespeare wrote many of his greatest works during ongoing outbreaks, including Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, Twelfth Night, The Winter's Tale, and Macbeth. This 'infectious' art form is often shut down as a means of stopping the spread of viruses and bacteria. The hardship often caused by pestilence on a grand scale, only demonstrates the prevailing nature of theatre.

When the Globe Theater in London experienced financial hardship during the COVID-19 Pandemic, members of the company came together to put on a socially-distanced production of Midsummer in the spring on 2021. Read more about the director's process and integrity of Shakespeare's artistry conducted by its performers here.