On 15th December 2010, Bexley Grammar School performed their version of Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' in the Great Hall at Hampton Court Palace.

The play had been performed in the Great Hall before, on New Year's Day 1604, by the King's Men for a newly crowned King James I.

Bexley Grammar School first performed the play at the Unicorn Theatre in Southwark as part of the Shakespeare Schools Festival, and they were invited to re-stage their performance for the grandest of all surviving theatres in which Shakespeare's plays were performed during his lifetime, the Great Hall.

The group visited the palace in November and spent a day with the Hampton Court Education Service, exploring the Great Hall, discovering how the stage was set four hundred years ago and practising techniques to help them adapt their performance from a modern stage setting.

Directed by Howard Otley, Catherine Woodcock and Chloe Palmer from Bexley Grammar School.

Thanks to Penelope Middelboe, Freya McCaie and everyone at the Shakespeare Schools Festival, and to James Wallis of Past Pleasures Ltd who led the workshop at Hampton Court Palace.