Stratford Shakespeare Festival production history it also produces a wide variety of theatre from Greek tragedy to Broadway musicals to contemporary works. By 2017, only three of the 14 productions were based on Shakespeare's works. The following is a chronological list of the productions that have been staged as part of the Stratford Festival since its inception. On February 17, 2015, AP News reported that the Stratford Festival plans to film all of Shakespeare's plays. The 1986 season was staged by Artistic Director John Neville with Shakespeare plays produced against a modern play with similar themes or characters (i.e. "Hamlet" and "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are
Shakespeare authorship question with such characters as the literary thief Poet-Ape in Ben Jonson's poem of the same name and the foolish poetry-lover Gullio in the university play "The Return from Parnassus" (performed c. 1601). Such characters are taken as broad hints indicating that the London theatrical world knew Shakespeare was a front for an anonymous author. Similarly, praises of "Shakespeare" the writer, such as those found in the First Folio, are explained as references to the real author's pen-name, not the man from Stratford. Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616 in Stratford, leaving a signed will to direct the disposal of his