When the protagonists in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet finally get to kiss on the lips, many of us forget that when the play was first staged it would have been two men engaged in this romantic clinch. And similarly in A Midsummer Night's Dream, the joyous marriage between Helena and Demetrius would have been enacted by two male performers.

During the Elizabethan period, women were prohibited from appearing on stage which meant that Lady Macbeth, Ophelia, Desdemona, Cordelia and every other great Shakespearean female character were all played by men or boys.  

Tradition reinvigorated

Fast forward several hundred years and the British theater director, Edward Hall decided to reinvigorate the tradition with an all-male production of Shakespeare's Othello in 1997. The company, Propeller - an all-male Shakespeare theater company now based in London - was founded soon after.

"I am just returning Shakespeare's works to how they used to be produced," Hall said.

Hall told the Global Times that his performance approach is to give as much of the creativity of the production to the performers as possible, and to engage the audience's imagination in a surprising way.

Hall also recognizes that this tradition will have a different impact on audiences today in comparison to how their Elizabethan counterparts would have viewed it. 

"This is what I think is the most interesting part of these plays. Just like when Viola in Twelfth Night says 'I am not what I am.' At that time it was spoken by a man playing a girl who was disguising herself as a boy. This makes you suddenly aware of the sexual confusion and, with cross-gender casting, the audience will focus more on the actual acting," Hall said.

Since 1997, Propeller have performed many of the Bard's works both in Britain and all around the world.

China tour

With Henry V and The Winter's Tale, the company has launched its latest China tour. After two nights in Beijing, they will play at the Lyceum Theater in Huangpu district, Shanghai, from June 13 to 16. This tour is taking place as part of UK Now, an on-going festival of British arts and culture across 17 Chinese cities between April and November 2012. This festival is organized by the Cultural and Education Section of the British Consulate-General in Shanghai.

Hall said that his inspiration for selecting Henry V and The Winter's Tale was the strong contrast in style between the two plays which guarantees to give audiences very different theatrical experiences.

Propeller's Henry V was premiered in 1998 and The Winter's Tale in 2005. In Hall's opinion, Henry V is a "great" historical play that was written to awaken nationalistic fervor in audiences of the time. "But The Winter's Tale strikes a very different note, and takes the audience on an extraordinary journey catalyzed by an inexplicable jealousy," he said.

Hall added: "Watching Shakespeare's plays, it is difficult to imagine all of them were written by the same person. For example, look at Richard III and The Comedy of Errors as contrasts; you have a great tragedy with lots of comedy in it, and a great comedy that has a very soulful, tragic undercurrent."

For Dugald Bruce Lockhart who plays Henry V, and Robert Hands who plays Leontes in The Winter's Tale, both believe the greatness of Shakespeare's works can never be constrained by time or place.

"Shakespeare is timeless as a writer," said Hands. "When he writes about people and their feelings, he could be writing about our society. The essence of what his characters say is no different from what people say today. I love how humane Shakespeare is."

Jealousy and greed

Hands also believes that Shakespeare doesn't judge his characters by simply turning them into "baddies;" everybody, it appears, is redeemable. "Just like Leontes in The Winters' Tale, Shakespeare shows the audience why the character is behaving in the way he is. Leontes is very jealous and greedy, but he still can be redeemed by the purity of his daughter and his friend's son, which is very touching for me," Hands said.

For Propeller, Hands has played female characters on three occasions with Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream being his particular favorite. He said that his approach to playing a female character is no different to that of a male. "I try to find the truth of the character as I would with any role. The gender is irrelevant in my preparation."

Lockhart described the sensation of being part of an all-male cast as akin to being in a football squad. "I miss the presence of women in a cast, of course, but luckily we have an amazing team of women in our stage management, without whom we'd be lost!"

Lockhart has only played one female character to date for Propeller, that of Olivia in Twelfth Night. "The difficult thing is not trying to act like a woman - the right thing to do is play it as you would a male part and let the text do the work," he said.

Henry V

Date: June 13 and 14, 7: 30 pm

The Winter's Tale

Date: June 15 and 16, 7: 30 pm

Venue: Lyceum Theater 兰心大戏院

Address: 57 Maoming Road South

茂名南路57号

Tickets: 80 to 380 yuan

Call 6217-2426, 6217-3055 for details