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The Midsummer Scene Festival
The Midsummer Scene Festival

The Midsummer Scene Festival turns Dubrovnik into the theatre centre of Europe

The beginning of summer in Dubrovnik also marks the beginning of the festival season, and the first of them is the Midsummer Scene Festival - the only festival of English theatre in Southeast Europe, also known as "the southernmost English theatre festival in Europe". It has been held for eight years and begins with the first days of summer, and following the centuries-old Dubrovnik tradition of open-air theatre, all performances are performed under the stars. The main stage of the festival is one of the most attractive and impressive backdrops - the Lovrjenac fortress.

The Midsummer Scene Festival is a project of the Dubrovnik Tourist Board and the City of Dubrovnik, and it is a joint production of the company Brilliant Events from Dubrovnik and Honey-tongued Theatre Productions Ltd. from London. This festival uniquely connects Dubrovnik and London, William Shakespeare and Marin Držić, intertwining the literary and dramatic heritage of these two cities in a truly special way.

The festival started in 2014, marking the 450th anniversary of Shakespeare's birth. Dubrovnik then joined the world celebration of this important year by staging one of Shakespeare's most famous comedies: "A Midsummer Night's Dream". The performance was a great success both with the audiences as well as with the artistic profession and critics. The Midsummer Scene Festival continues to be held every year and greatly enriched the cultural offer of Dubrovnik in the pre-tourist season, and Shakespeare's works remained its backbone.
Midsummer Scene Festival 2022: To Be or Not To Be

The eighth edition of the Midsummer Scene Festival took place in Dubrovnik from June 21 to July 5, 2022, under the significant name To Be or Not To Be. This slogan, playing with the famous words of Shakespeare, reflects the attitude of the organizers who, even in the past two extremely difficult years, did not think about stopping the festival. In the pandemic period, the festival took place in the Marin Držić Theatre, a space named after one of the two playwrights who have marked this festival so far.

As part of this year's festival, which once again returned to the spectacular stage at Lovrjenac, the play "A Poor Player", a monodrama with elements of farce, which its co-authors Filip Krenus and Sean Aita, highlighted as a melancomedy and which was written precisely for Dubrovnik.

This year, the festival continued its cooperation with the Marin Držić Theatre, so the latest successful performance of the KMD ensemble was presented - "Hamlet - the record of the crimes of a monarchy", an adaptation by Tibor Hrs Pandur and Livija Pandur based on the text of B.M. Koltes and W. Shakespeare directed by Livija Pandur.

Midsummer Scene Festival 2022 was closed with a spectacular music-stage project by the vocal group Klapa Kaša called "Millions of Strange Shadows". Namely, it is a really special project that aimed to set the legendary sonnets of Shakespeare to music in a specific way with elements of Dubrovnik troubadour music and klapa song.

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