Shakespeare in performance works were plundered for these scenes. Among the drolls taken from Shakespeare were "Bottom the Weaver" (Bottom's scenes from "A Midsummer Night's Dream") and "The Grave-makers" (the gravedigger's scene from "Hamlet"). At the Restoration in 1660, Shakespeare's plays were divided between the two newly licensed companies: the King's Company of Thomas Killigrew and the Duke's Men of William Davenant. The licensing system prevailed for two centuries; from 1660 to 1843, only two main companies regularly presented Shakespeare in London. Davenant, who had known early-Stuart actors such as John Lowin and Joseph Taylor, was the main figure establishing some continuity with
Southern Shakespeare Festival students benefitting from its educational programming during its 1996–2000 existence. In 2012, the Southern Shakespeare Festival was revived thanks to Dr. Kevin Carr, Dr. Brent Griffin, and a dedicated group of Tallahassee theater artisans, most notably Laura W. Johnson, Catherine Leonard, and Lanny Thomas. The Capital City Amphitheater at Cascades Park is the new home of the revitalized festival and appropriately, its first production, which ran April 17–19, 2015, was "A Midsummer Night's Dream", directed by Lanny Thomas, and starring special guest AEA artist Jef Canter as Nick Bottom. The Southern Shakespeare Festival is greatly supported by local and state