Egeon has sailed the seas for five long years in search of his son. Landing in Ephesus, where Syracusans are forbidden, Egeon is arrested on sight and sentenced for execution that same day—unless he can pay a hefty ransom.

Egeon is asked to tell his sad story. Long ago, he and his wife, their infant twin sons and infant twin servants were shipwrecked and separated. Egeon, with one son named Antipholus and his servant named Dromio, were saved and returned home to Syracuse; but his wife and the other two boys were never seen again. Then, 18 years later, Antipholus and Dromio set out from Syracuse in search of their missing brothers. Egeon has not seen them since they left five years ago.

As luck would have it, though, that very same morning those same two young men also arrive in Ephesus. And by another strange stroke of fate, Antipholus’s twin (also named Antipholus) has been living in Ephesus for years with his servant—named Dromio... By everyone who encounters one twin or another—including Antipholus of Ephesus’s wife Adriana—the brothers are apparently indistinguishable. And so mistaken identity, misadventure and mishap turn the once-ordered life of Ephesus completely topsy-turvy.

As the visitors to Ephesus grow ever more certain that this strange land is bewitched, the natives of the once-quiet town draw their own conclusions. All hope of sanity seems quite lost—until an Abbess possessing knowledge of life beyond the cloistered walls amazes the townspeople and their visitors alike.  

– Contributed by the CST Education Department

Act-by-Act Synopsis

Dramatis Personae

A Scholar’s Perspective by Clark Hulse
Clark Hulse explains his particular seven theories of comedy.

Shakespeare's Sources
Shakespeare based The Comedy of Errors on Menaechmi, by the Roman playwright Plautus, who tells the story of a Syracusean merchant, the father of identical twin sons. After one of the twins is kidnapped, his infant brother is renamed in his memory, and years later goes to search for his lost identical twin.

Historical Context
A traveling troupe of players presents The Comedy of Errors in David H. Bell’s production. Shakespeare’s plays were performed at London’s first playhouses, but were surely performed on the road, as well.

Performance History
The stage history of The Comedy of Errors could be compared to that of the late comedic actor Rodney Dangerfield. It gets no respect—and there, in some ways, lies the key to its success.

Scholars, Authors and Artists on The Comedy of Errors
Straight-out farce or a more complex vision of life's instability? Since the late 1500s, many voices have weighed in, included Coleridge, Swinburne and Dowden.

Delving Deeper
A portal to the world of Shakespeare, these selected internet sites lead further into the exploration of Shakespeare in performance, his life and times, the original texts, and much more.

David H. Bell (Director) returns to Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where his recent credits include The Three Musketeers and the Short Shakespeare! productions of The Comedy of Errors, Macbeth and The Taming of The Shrew. Other CST directing credits include the fulllength productions of The Taming of the Shrew, As You Like It, Much Ado About Nothing and The Comedy of Errors. Other recent Chicago credits include Oliver!, Footloose and Shenandoah (The Marriott Theatre). His extensive work as a director, choreographer and writer at a host of Chicago theaters has earned him ten Jeff Awards and 33 nominations. Internationally, he has staged productions in London, Paris, Berlin, Zurich, Vienna and the Barcelona Olympics. As associate artistic director for Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre, his directing credits included: Art, Chess, The Grapes of Wrath, The Sum of Us, Hot Mikado, Little Me, Romeo and Juliet, The Dark at the Top of the Stairs, One Last Summer, Dreams from a Summer House, Once on This Island, La Bête, Falsettos and Boys from Syracuse. He has directed on and off Broadway and at Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, the Royal National Theatre and Berkshire Theatre Festival. He also served as artistic director of the historic Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C. His awards and honors include: the Helen Hayes Award (D.C.); Dramalogue Award; Mac and Bistro Awards (New York); two After Dark Awards (Chicago); two National Endowment for the Arts Playwriting Fellowships; and a Laurence Olivier Award nomination (London) for Hot Mikado.

A Conversation with Director David Bell
Director David H. Bell discusses how the world of the play and the play-within-a-play are created for this abridged production of The Comedy of Errors when it first premiered at CST.