History Theatre / AMidSummerNightsDream

* PetTheDog: Oberon is hardly the nicest of characters, but he does feel sorry for Helena and attempt to help her by getting Demetrius to fall in love with her. Unfortunately, that just makes things ''worse''.

* AdaptationalAngstDowngrade: As part of its simplification of the story, the George Balanchine ballet adaptation downplays the lovers' quarrel in the forest. When Demetrius wakes up and declares his love for Helena, she reciprocates almost immediately after a moment of surprise, and does not doubt his sincerity as she did in the original. Hermia's life-threatening plight imposed by her father and her temporary falling-out with Helena in the forest are also removed. In addition, despite being a two-act ballet, the whole story is resolved by the end of Act I, with Act II consisting of an extended wedding dance celebration without any narrative drama.

* AdaptationalAngstDowngrade: As part of its simplification of the story, the George Balanchine ballet adaptation downplays the lovers' quarrel in the forest. When Demetrius wakes up and declares his love for Helena, she reciprocates almost immediately after a moment of surprise, and does not doubt his sincerity as she did in the original. Hermia's life-threatening plight and her temporary falling-out with Helena in the forest are also removed. In addition, despite being a two-act ballet, the whole story is resolved by the end of Act I, with Act II consisting of an extended wedding dance celebration without any narrative drama.

** 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 suspicion and then anger directed at Oberon for having messed with her.
-->'''Titania:''' ''(suspiciously)'' How came these things to pass?
-->'''Oberon:''' ''(laughs quietly)''
-->'''Titania:''' ''(to Oberon; angrily)'' O, how mine eyes do loathe your visage now!
** Another minor inversion, early on, with Francis Flute: upon being told he will play the lady Thisbe, he is very happy and shows none of the reluctance of his counterpart from the original text.

* AdaptationalAngstDowngrade: As part of its simplification of the story, the George Balanchine ballet adaptation downplays the lovers' quarrel in the forest. When Demetrius wakes up and declares his love for Helena, she reciprocates almost immediately after a moment of surprise, and does not doubt his sincerity as she did in the original. Hermia's life-threatening plight and her temporary falling-out with Helena in the forest are also removed.

%%* ArrangedMarriage: Demetrius and Hermia.

* DoubleStandardRapeDivineOnMortal: Titania is dosed with a love potion, and forced to fall desperately in love with the next thing she sees, which is Bottom. As he's having a rough day, he proposes 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 him is never played as anything but hilarity, not say, kidnapping and sex slavery. The trope is complicated by the fact that she herself is acting under the influence of a love charm administered by Oberon.

%%* LovePotion: The fairies' magic flower juice.%%Is?
* {{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 "[[BestialityIsDepraved deflowered my dear!]]" Instead of "devoured".

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 (though he 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.

Of course, it all gets straightened out in the end, everyone is paired off in a triple wedding, and the local tradesmen get to perform their [[StylisticSuck hilariously awful]] play for the Duke and entourage.

* DiesDifferentlyIAdaptation: [[spoiler:In the original mythology, Theseus was thrown off a cliff by King Lycomedes. Due to the play having been set at an earlier point in Theseus' life and thus, lacking Lycomedes, the more overtly villainous Theseus in this adaptation of the play dies from a heart attack.]]

* AdaptationalDiversity: This specific production featyres a bisexual Titania, a lesbian Hippolyta played by the half-English, half-Japanese Eleanor Matsuura, a black Oberon played by Nonso Anozie, a Sri Lankan Puck, a black, ambiguously bi Demetrius, a gender-flipped Quince, a black Snug, Flute and Egeus and an Indian Peaseblossom.

** There's a line where Puck says, "When they him spy, As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye, Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort, Rising and cawing at the gun's report." Problem, [[CriticalResearchFailure guns were not invented for centuries]]!

* 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 and oats).

* WesternAnimation/HouseOfMouse did an adaptation of the play for one of their ''Mouse Tales'' segments, staring Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Scrooge, Von Drake, and Goofy as Lysander, Hermia, Demetrius, Helena, Egeus, Theseus and Puck respectively. Apart from some incorporating some cartoon gags here and there and omitting the subplot of Oberon getting revenge on his wife, the short stays rather faithful to the original play.

* ThePowerOfFriendship: Helena tries to use this trope to win over Hermia in the confusion in the woods when she thinks that Hermia betrayed her. It Doesn't Work. (Made worse in that Helena betrays Hermia first)

* TheLostWoods: They're populated by fairies.

* LovePotion: The fairies' magic flower juice.

* ManOfAThousandVoices: An InUniverse variation. Bottom firmly believes that he's such an incredible actor that he could easily play ''all'' of the roles in "Pyramus and Thisbe"...problem is, he's barely able to play his own role, let alone any other.

** ''All'' the mechanicals have meaningful names.

This is the play that that kid killed himself over in ''Film/DeadPoetsSociety''. Also, [[LohengrinAndMendelssohn that music which plays at the end of weddings]]? Music/FelixMendelssohn wrote it for an 1846 production of this play.

* ArrangedMarriage: Demetrius and Hermia.

-->'''Titania:''' Out of this wood do not desire to go:
-->Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no.
-->I am a spirit of no common rate;
-->The summer still doth tend upon my state.

[[AC: Film]]

->''This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard.''

* ClingyJealousGirl: Helena follow Demetrius into the woods all the way from Athens because she's that clingy.

** 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 Melmoth production at the Greenwich Theatre, simply swapping their names), resulting in gay and lesbian relationships.<note>Probably one of the earliest versions to take this route was the 1997 Bailiwick production directed by Scott Cooper; to top it off, the fairies were male and the mechanicals were female.</note> 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.

** 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 Melmoth production at the Greenwich Theatre, 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.