You can't always get what you want. But you just might get what you need. The path to bliss is uncertain when you try to make somebody love you. Helena wants Bertram, but Bertram isn't interested in her. Can Helena's determination and clever trickery lead to a happily-ever-after? Shakespeare's provocative comedy eventually "ends well," but not without a measure of hurt, lies, and mistakes to get there. In the intimacy of the New Theatre, Amanda Dehnert directs Shakespeare’s coming-of-adulthood fairy tale of flawed and beautiful people finding their way.
Running Time: 2 hours 33 minutes, with one intermission
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Videos:Production Preview (1:29)About the play (6:00)10 Fun Facts about All's Well that Ends Well (5:51)
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Play image: Kjerstine Anderson (Helena)
and Danforth Comins (Bertram).
Age recommendation: This "problem" play contains sophisticated themes and dark humor, as well as physical and verbal comedy. Suitable for prepared middle-school youth and up.
Please note: Children under 6 are not admitted to plays or other events.
e-Luminations: The Women of
All's Well
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Videos:
About the play (6:00)
Thoughts on the production (1:46)
Synopsis: Following the death of her father, a celebrated doctor, Helena becomes the ward of the Countess of Rossillion. Helena has long hidden her deep love for Bertram, the countess’ son, with whom she’s grown up. Following his own father’s recent death, Bertram has been called to Paris to become a ward of the king.
Unable to live without Bertram, Helena resolves to travel to Paris. Her plan is to cure the ailing king with one of her father’s remedies. The countess gives Helena her blessing for her pursuit of Bertram.
Meanwhile, war has broken out in Italy, and the noblemen of the court are going to fight. Bertram is told he’s too young and can’t go. Frustrated, he sullenly bids farewell to his friends.
The king thinks his illness is hopeless and rejects Helena’s offered cure. Undaunted, she raises the stakes: If her remedy doesn’t work, she will give up her life. But if it does, the king must give her the husband of her choice. Awed by her conviction, he agrees.
Helena’s cure is a miracle. Keeping his promise, the king offers her the choice of French nobility, but she chooses Bertram. Shocked, he refuses—pleading with the king to be able to choose his own wife, when he is ready. Helena, hurt, begs the king to let her suit go, but he orders Bertram to marry her. In a flash, they are wed.
Influenced by his talkative and flamboyant friend Parolles, Bertram decides to go to the Italian war— running away from this marriage and the tyranny of the king.
He sends Helena home to his mother with a seemingly impossible ultimatum: He will be her husband only if she gets the ring off his hand and is pregnant with his child. Helena blames herself for sending her beloved to a war zone. She embarks on a pilgrimage, knowing Bertram will return once she is gone.
In Florence, Bertram achieves honor on the battlefield. He meets a young beauty named Diana and unexpectedly falls in love. Feeling compassion for his abandoned wife, she refuses his advances.
By coincidence (or perhaps design) Helena arrives in Florence and meets Diana and her mother. Together, the women hatch a plan to fulfill Bertram’s demands. Diana encourages Bertram’s passion. Convinced it will win her, Bertram exchanges rings with her (Diana gives him Helena’s ring). She promises to meet him in bed — where Helena will be waiting in the dark. Before their rendezvous, Bertram receives a letter from his mother, telling him of Helena's supposed “death.”
The other soldiers revile Parolles for his empty boasting and set a trap to expose him. They pretend to be the enemy and force him to spill the secrets of the camp and Bertram’s extramarital desire for Diana. Hurt and betrayed, Bertram turns his back on his friend and returns to France alone.
The king and the countess mourn the loss of Helena, but with the return of Bertram, now a war hero, they arrange a new marriage for him. Agreeing, Bertram offers to send a ring as proof of his commitment. The king recognizes Helena’s ring and accuses Bertram of killing her. Bertram hotly denies it, claiming the ring was thrown to him in Florence. Unfortunately for him, Diana arrives. She confronts Bertram and tells the court that he bedded her and promised to marry her, as proved by her possession of Bertram’s family ring.
Bertram is caught in his lie. At which point, Diana reveals Helena. At her appearance, as if from the dead, the court is filled with wonder. Helena shows Bertram that she has fulfilled the requirements of his letter, asking “Will you be mine now you are doubly won?” Bertram agrees, to the joy of the court. —Lezlie Cross