Exploring Shakespeare

An exquisitely poised and modulated Hermione, proving once again that given an actress who has beauty and tranquillity this queen can never fail to move us.

Act and Scene
Credit: CIW, Birmingham Mail
Date: 1948
Copyright: ©

Hermione is his trophy wife, a Midwestern beauty-contest winner of recent and earnest gentility.

Act and Scene
Credit: Rhoda Koenig, The Independent
Date: 2002
Copyright: ©

[Hermione] has clearly spent weeks on bread and water in some cramped dungeon. This frail sweaty figure speaks with simple humility and utterly unaffected dignity. She has been bitterly wronged – and she is more queen than ever she was.

Act and Scene
Credit: Benedict Nightingale, The Times
Date: 1999
Copyright: ©

A loving no-nonsense Hermione [doubles as a Perdita who is] sweet but unsickly, spirited and fresh.