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“There is pure magic to Shakespeare’s last plays,” The New York Times has written, “they are the playwright’s final musings on life. The Winter’s Tale is a play of tranquility, wit and mystery.” This “late romance” by Shakespeare has apparently never had a major professional production in Kansas City. The
Winter’s Tale begins darkly, when a jealous king suspects his queen of being unfaithful with his own best friend. “The spectacle of a man transformed by his own mounting suspicion as it feeds upon itself is powerful and credible,” said Newsweek.
“Now the stage is set for disaster…” As The Winter’s Tale progresses, the mood turns lighter, then suspenseful, and the play finally achieves a beautiful and magical conclusion. “For sheer joy in
life and breath at the present moment,” wrote Harold C. Goddard in The Meaning of Shakespeare, “the fourth act of The Winter’s Tale is one of Shakespeare’s pinnacles…a very superfluity of comic
and romantic riches.” The New York Times has said of The Winter’s Tale, “Shakespeare’s mixture here of fate, nature and human character is interwoven with poetry and humor, producing [a]
tapestry of complex patterning and vivid color.” The New Yorker has commented, “The mayhem of The Winter’s Tale…is meant to renew the living’s sense of life.”.
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