History Theatre / AMidSummerNightsDream

* {{Malaproper}}: Bottom, who is the poster boy for this trope, saying, for example, 'odious' for 'odours' and 'Ninny's tomb' for 'Ninus' tomb' (Ninus was the legendary founder of Nineveh). Bottom goes onto say that the lion "deflowered my dear!" Instead of "devoured".

* AndYouWereThere: In many productions, the actors playing Theseus and Hippolyta also play Oberon and Titania. Theseus' servant Philostrate is usually Puck as well. Some productions even go the whole nine yards and double Flute, Snug, Snout and Starveling as Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth and Mustardseed (in no particular order).

** The 1999 film introduces lots of sexual elements. Lysander tries to have sex with Hermia in the woods before they fall asleep, Hermia and Helena have a sexy mud fight, there are {{Fanservice Extra}}s among Titania's entourage, Bottom and Titania have sex, the four lovers are found naked by Theseus and Hippolyta, and the epilogue has scenes of them all sleeping together after the wedding.

* ItAmusedMe: Puck's screwing up with the love potion. Sure it was a mistake but he's enjoying the results. "Then will two at once woe one. That must needs be sport alone. All these things do best please me, that which falls preposterously."

* A 1999 Hollywood production set in 19th Century Italy, featuring yet another [[invoked]]AllStarCast-- Creator/KevinKline as Bottom, Creator/SamRockwell as Flute, Creator/MichellePfeiffer as Titania, Creator/CalistaFlockhart as Helena, and Creator/ChristianBale as Demetrius.

* DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale: Titania is dosed with a love potion, and forced to fall desperately in love with the next thing she sees. That would be the aforementioned Bottom. As soon as love-mad Titania casts eyes on Bottom, she wants him. Bottom, (who's having a rough day) decides to head home, not realizing that she's a fairy queen, and fairy queens aren't used to hearing the word "No". The scene of her capturing Bottom is never played as anything but hilarity, not say, kidnapping and sex slavery.

* RapeByProxy: Oberon more or less commits this against both Titania and Bottom by drugging the former with a love potion that causes her to fall desperately in love with the latter, capturing and having her way with him.

** Inverted with Titania; she is perfectly fine with having had a tryst with Bottom, and even smiles and waves at him in the final scene. When the charm is lifted from her eyes and she sees him lying asleep beside her, she does not react with horror, but instead with first suspicion and then anger with Oberon for having messed with her.

* CastFullOfGay: As expected, being a Creator/RussellTDavies production. Flute and one of the Athens guardsmen hit it off, Titania is romantic with Oberon, Bottom and Hippolyta, Demetrius sees Lysander under the love spell but also comments on Flute's attractiveness whilst the latter is playing Thisbe. As Hippolyta shows exactly zero affection for Theseus, we could conclude that gives two gay, two bisexual, and one lesbian in the characters.

* NerdsAreSexy: Hermia seems to think so, preferring the bespectacled Potteresque Lysander to the conventionally handsome, manly Demetrius. Demetrius himself has a minute with this trope too, thanks to the magic flower...

* TinyGuyHugeGirl: Downplayed. Demetrius is not tiny, but the statuesque Helena is still considerably taller than him. She also towers over Lysander and especially Hermia who has to jump up to kiss her on the cheek.

* SignificantDoubleCasting: Several productions have the same actors play Oberon / Theseus and Titania / Hippolyta. Partly because there's something of a parallel between their two marriages, and the significance will no doubt be clear to the audience, partly because a) this way you don't have two actors off-stage for most of the play, and b) the four characters never appear on stage at the same time, so you can get away with it.

* A [[Film/AMidsummerNightsDream1935 1935 Hollywood production]] directed by Max Reinhardt and Creator/WilliamDieterle. The [[invoked]]AllStarCast included Creator/JamesCagney as Bottom, Creator/OliviaDeHavilland in her film debut as Hermia, Otis Harlan of ''Disney/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs'' fame as Starveling, Creator/DickPowell as Lysander, and a fourteen-year-old Creator/MickeyRooney as Puck.

*** IronicName: In the 1935 film, he is played by the chubby, jovial-looking [[Disney/SnowWhiteandtheSevenDwarfs Otis Harlan]].

* AppliedPhlebotinum: The flower.

* BalefulPolymorph: Bottom's head turned into that of an ass. Subverted, in that... he never seems to actually notice that anything is different (although he does express a craving for hay at one point).

** Puck's final speech.

* NotWhatItLooksLike

* OurFairiesAreDifferent: Many contemporary productions of this play portray the fairies with some variation of this. In fact the original play used this trope by making the fairies actually less sinister than they were commonly portrayed at the time.

* Benjamin Britten wrote an opera of the play in 1960.

Two young Athenians, Hermia and Lysander, are in love. Alas, Hermia's wealthy father Egeus has just [[ArrangedMarriage promised]] her to another man named Demetrius, who promptly ends his relationship with his own girl, Helena. Helena, as it happens, is Hermia's best friend, and she's more than a little annoyed that Demetrius chose money over love. The lovers go to court, where Duke Theseus (who has his own impending marriage to Hippolyta, an Amazon queen, on his mind), rules in favor of Egeus. He gives Hermia the choice to accept the marriage, be executed, or become a nun.

Meanwhile, Oberon, King of the Fairies, is in a petty quarrel with his wife, whom he plans to prank with [[LovePotion magical eyedrops that will make anyone fall in love with the next person they see]]. After eavesdropping on Helena and Demetrius and seeing how he spurns her, Oberon takes pity on her and sends his servant Puck to give the potion to "a youth in Athenian garb," traveling in the woods with a woman, so that she will be the first thing he sees. Oberon then finds Titania asleep and applies the juice to her eyes.

Puck duly uses the potion on a young man in Athenian garb asleep in the woods near a young woman. Unfortunately, it was ''Lysander'', not Demetrius, and the first woman he sees is Helena. Hermia wakes to find that her beau is now madly in love with her best friend. Unaware of his error, Puck proceeds to his part of the prank regarding Titania. He finds a none-too-bright actor in a group rehearsing a play to be performed at Theseus' wedding, turns his head into a donkey's, scares off the rest of the performers, and leaves him where Titania will see him.

Upon discovering that the wrong Athenian was hexed, Oberon tries to mend matters by giving the potion to the intended victim, Demetrius. This backfires too, and now ''both'' men have rejected Hermia and are close to blows over Helena, who thinks that the other three are mocking her. Meanwhile, Titania is in love with the guy with a donkey's head (although the victim, Mr. Nick Bottom, doesn't seem too distressed), Oberon is frustrated at the failure of his plans, and it's going to take some serious DeusExMachina to repair all this chaos.

So Hermia and Lysander slip away by night. Before they leave, Hermia confides in Helena and asks her not to tell anyone; naturally, Helena tells Demetrius in hopes of getting back into his good graces. Demetrius follows the lovers, with Helena chasing after him, and all of them end up lost in the same forest.

Puck duly uses the potion on a young man in Athenian garb asleep in the woods near a young woman. Unfortunately, it was ''Lysander'', not Demetrius, and the woman who wakes him is Helena. Hermia wakes to find that her beau is now madly in love with her best friend. Unaware of his error, Puck proceeds to his part of the prank regarding Titania. He finds a none-too-bright actor in a group rehearsing a play to be performed at Theseus' wedding, turns his head into a donkey's, scares off the rest of the performers, and leaves him where Titania will see him.

Upon discovering that the wrong Athenian was hexed, Oberon tries to mend matters by giving the potion to the intended victim, Demetrius. This backfires too, and now ''both'' of Hermia's former suitors are fighting over Helena, who thinks that the other three are mocking her. Meanwhile, Titania is in love with the guy with a donkey's head (although the victim, Mr. Nick Bottom, doesn't seem too distressed), Oberon is frustrated at the failure of his plans, and it's going to take some serious DeusExMachina to repair all this chaos.

* DoorClosesEnding: The 1935 film ends with Puck closing a door at Theseus's palace after giving his BreakingTheFourthWall closing speech.

* FakeShemp: Creator/MickeyRooney had to be doubled by George Breakston in many scenes of the 1930s film, as he broke his leg during filming.

* {{Intermission}}: The 1935 film actually has a title card that says "Intermission 10 Minutes".
* LohengrinAndMendelssohn: As noted above, the "Mendelssohn" part, namely the "Wedding March" (the now-traditional wedding recessional music), was originally written by Music/FelixMendelssohn as part of his incidental music for an 1842 stage production of this play. (The 1935 film uses some of Mendelssohn's music, including the Wedding March in the scene where Titania takes Bottom to her "bower".)

* A 1935 Hollywood production directed by Max Reinhardt and Creator/WilliamDieterle. The [[invoked]]AllStarCast included Creator/JamesCagney as Bottom, Creator/OliviaDeHavilland in her film debut as Hermia, Otis Harlan of ''Disney/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs'' fame as Starveling, Creator/DickPowell as Lysander, and a fourteen-year-old Creator/MickeyRooney as Puck.

* FairySexy: Titania is often given a form-flattering gown.

** Titania's fairies can be of either gender (although they are referred to with male forms of address in the text by Bottom), Puck is occasionally played as female, and various members of the Mechanicals are sometimes played as women.

A comedy set in ancient Athens about a LoveDodecahedron gone out of control thanks to the meddling of fairies with a LovePotion. By Creator/WilliamShakespeare.

Two young Athenians, Hermia and Lysander, are in love. Unfortunately, Hermia's father Egeus has just [[ArrangedMarriage promised]] her to another man named Demetrius. Demetrius' former girl, Helena, just happens to be Hermia's best friend and is now angry that Demetrius has chosen the wealthy Hermia over the woman he used to love. They go to court, where Duke Theseus (who has his own impending marriage to Hippolyta, an Amazon queen, on his mind), rules in Egeus' favor. He gives Hermia the choice to accept the marriage, be executed, or become a nun.

So Hermia and Lysander run away by night. Before they leave, Hermia confides in Helena and asks her not to tell anyone; naturally, Helena tells Demetrius in hopes of getting back into his good graces. Demetrius follows the lovers, with Helena chasing after him, and all of them end up lost in the same forest.

* A 1999 Hollywood production set in 19th Century Italy, featuring yet another [[invoked]]AllStarCast-- Creator/KevinKline as Bottom, Creator/SamRockwell as Flute, Creator/MichellePfeiffer as Titania, Calista Flockhart as Helena, and Creator/ChristianBale as Demetrius.

** Numerous 21st century productions, such as Sheila Daniels' 2011 Seattle Shakespeare Company performance or Emma Rice's 2016 version at The Globe, have also gender-swapped Helena or Lysander or both (often renaming them Helenus and/or Lysandra - or, in the case of the 2004 Greenwich Theatre production, simply swapping their names), resulting in gay and lesbian relationships. A female Lysander can add another level to the "forbidden love" aspect of her relationship with Hermia and lend a plausible homophobic aspect to Egeus' reason for opposing it (and his speech about Lysander "bewitching" his daughter). A male Helena, on the other hand, can turn Demetrius' character arc into a ComingOutStory and lend credence to the theory that he was in denial of his true feelings at the beginning of the story (because, in this case, he was closeted); this can re-contextualise his "But like a sickness did I loathe this food..." speech in a very moving way.

** There are a couple of references to other Shakespeare plays: upon receiving the part of Thisbe, Francis Flute says [[Theatre/{{Hamlet}} "To thine own self be true!"]] and the final celebratory dance number is a musical setting of [[Theatre/AsYouLikeIt "It was a Lover and his Lass"]].

* TooDumbToLive: Helena. Go run to the unknown woods, chasing after a guy that is very angry with your PsychoticLover behaviour, who has a very short fuse. Demitrius openly states that it's "brave" of her and that he very well could "do [her] some mischief", which she doesn't seem nearly bothered enough by.

-->'''Titania:''' ''(to Oberon; angrily) O, how mine eyes do loathe your visage now!

** Inverted with Titania; she is perfectly fine with having had a tryst with Bottom, and even smiles and waves at him in the final scene. When the charm is lifted from her eyes and she sees him lying asleep beside her, she does not react with horror, but instead with first suspicion and then anger with Oberon for having messed with her, when she addresses her slightly altered lines to him: "How came these things to pass? O how mine eyes do loathe ''your'' visage now!"

* BigDamnKiss: Several of them in the final scenes, but most epic is the one between Titania and [[spoiler:Hippolyta, both of whom have spread their wings and flown up to the rafters hand-in-hand]].