"Playing Theseus and Oberon is great", said young actor Ben Hills. "Both characters are very  powerful but one's mortal and the other' more like a superhero. The play's cut down to half an hour but all the story is all there. It's been great working with Alistair because he is very creative and makes it fun."  It is an extremely shortened (only half an hour!) version for the Shakespeare for Schools Festival. They will performing at the Barnfield Theatre in Exeter on 5 February, the only Youth Theatre participating in the South West. The festival has over 1100 schools participating, performing in over 100 theatres across the UK.  The festival is a unique arts-education initiative which enables young people to perform abridged productions of Shakespeare’s most famous plays in their local professional theatre.

The cast of 14 have been rehearsing over the Christmas holidays, when not performing in Peter Pan, and have been coming in for extra rehearsals as the competition has been hotting up.  The Youth Theatre has called on a talented composer from Bridport, Robert Lee, to compose the music for the production. The music is performed by the young cast, playing a range of instruments from flute and  clarinet to yukulele and hunting horn. Percussion plays a large part with drums, bells and rattles. Anna Guest aged 13 said "I play the tambourine and the whistle; it was hard at first because the rhythm is complicated, but now I've got it, and it's great. Robert's music really makes it more magical; it brightens it and makes it sound more mystical"

The cast range in age from 11 to 15 and some have been acting with Lyme Youth theatre for a several years. The director, Alistair Ganley from Exeter's Cygnet Theatre has directed them in several of their extremely successful productions and is enjoying the challenge of a 30 minute Shakespeare. Tickets for this half hour production are available from the Lyme Tourist Information Centre 01297 442138 at £4.00 and £2.00 for children.