The Royal Shakespeare Company

Autumn 1918. A group of soldiers return from the trenches. The world-weary Benedick and his friend Claudio find themselves reacquainted with Beatrice and Hero. As memories of conflict give way to a life of parties and masked balls, Claudio and Hero fall madly, deeply in love, while Benedick and Beatrice reignite their own altogether more combative courtship.

Shakespeare’s comic romance plays out amidst the brittle high spirits of a post-war house party, as youthful passions run riot, lovers are deceived and happiness is threatened – before peace ultimately wins out.

One of the most popular comedies in the English language, Much Ado About Nothing was possibly known in Shakespeare’s lifetime as Love’s Labour’s Won.

Following a 2014 run in Stratford-upon-Avon and a subsequent run in Chichester, the RSC Chichester Festival Theatre productions of the heart-warming double bill Love’s Labour’s Lost and Much Ado About Nothing (or Love’s Labour’s Won) will transfer to the Theatre Royal Haymarket for a limited season.